


A Common Agony

by finefeatheredfriend



Category: Far Cry (Video Games), Far Cry 5
Genre: Alternate Ending, Angst, Cannibalism, Canon-Typical Violence, Drug Use, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to friends to brothers, Gulf War Syndrome, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Inappropriate Humor, Intentional drug overdose by minor character, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Provided you like the Seeds, References to Drugs, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-11-02 11:50:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 28,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20736608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/finefeatheredfriend/pseuds/finefeatheredfriend
Summary: Tobias Rook has dealt with most of the Seed family, but he finds himself doubting when it's time to confront Jacob.Once the bombs drop, the two must learn how to get along to save one another from themselves.





	1. I'm Not Killing You Today

**Author's Note:**

> So a few people have shown an interest in seeing more, so I'm planning a ten chapter fic of Jacob and Tobias in the bunker. It will have lots of flashbacks to flesh out Tobias' history.

Tobias Rook was not a man to be trifled with. At six feet, six and a half inches tall, he towered over most of the residents of Hope County. Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, he had moved to Hope County after a stint as an Army sniper in hopes of becoming a game warden, but when a position opened up for a county deputy, he couldn’t pass up the opportunity. It had been quiet, easy. Too easy. Now that the Peggies had taken over, he was relieved for the opportunity to relive some of his military days. Army veterans, in Rook’s opinion, made the worst cops, himself included, because they were always looking for trouble. He had come home with a chip on his shoulder the size of the state he was from, and with an ability to hit targets that only maybe forty people in the world could match. He had lost an eye to shrapnel, his left one, fortunately, but it had been enough to get him sent home and not allowed to re-enlist. He liked it overseas, liked the heat, liked the combat. Liked feeling something other than just numb as he had ever since his wife and daughter had died in a car accident.

It had been a drunk driver. Reckless. Stupid. Out of his control.

Tobias liked being in control. He liked taking out Peggies from a half mile away, liked reclaiming Holland Valley from that snot-nosed shit John Seed. He had been hard pressed not to kill the little bastard, but he had resisted the urge and both John and his adoptive sister Faith Seed, AKA Rachel Jessop were sitting pretty at the Hope County Jail under the watchful eye of Tobias’ boss Sheriff Earl Whitehorse. Joseph Seed didn’t know that, though. Joseph Seed thought his siblings were dead. Let him, Tobias had thought bitterly. Let him feel the pain of losing the people he loved most. Then maybe he would really understand the “Death” that had come with Whitehorse as the manbunned, hipster prick with an aversion to wearing shirts had labelled Tobias with heavy-handed metaphors.

Whitehorse had been hesitant to hire Tobias. He had seen the cold, dead-eyed stare that Tobias could slip into sometimes, that eerie, murderous look as his humanity slipped away, gone like the mask it really was. He was a broken man, but he was good at what he did. When the other deputies called him “Rookie” it was tongue-in-cheek, the way people will call huge men “Tiny” or name squeaky, rat like dogs “Thor” or “Brutus.” Tobias was no rookie. He’d seen too much to be called that with any seriousness.

Which is why Tobias struggled to resist Jacob Seed’s message. Because he agreed with it. The world was weak. Mankind was falling. This whole fucking shitshow of a nation was going down the can and there wasn’t a goddamn thing anybody could do about it now. He respected Jacob. Hell, he _liked_ him. He had listened to his gravelly, cough-interrupted rants with his face too close to the camera, his eyes looking just as dead, just as empty as Tobias’ own and found himself nodding in agreement at the words.

Eli Palmer hadn’t stood a chance. Or, at least, he wouldn’t have had Jacob actually managed to brainwash Tobias. The deputy had seen his ploy from a hundred miles away, recognized some of the techniques from basic training, and then the really fucked-up techniques from more advanced trainings. That’s all the military was at its core: reprogramming a human being to be okay with following orders, _any_ orders, even ones they disagreed with. The military valued obedience, not thought. So Tobias had played Jacob’s little game, winging, and in some cases killing, Peggies or other trainees that were thrown at him, doing just enough damage to convince Jacob that he was tame. The needs of the many outweighed the needs of the few. Jacob was right about that. So when Jacob Seed sent Tobias into the Wolf’s Den and turned him loose like a lion in a field of lambs, he did what was necessary. Mostly leg shots, or shoulder shots, things that would heal and could be treated if the bleeding was stopped quickly enough.

When Tobias sprinted around the corner into Eli’s strategy room and used not his rifle, but his sidearm, to shoot Eli, Eli had known it was going to happen. He was wearing a vest. Jacob had gone on his little rant, had hummed his little song and Tobias had just stood there, allowing himself to go blank, to look dead inside as Eli took weak, shallow breaths, seemingly dying. Then Jacob had stepped outside, allowing Eli to take a deep, desperate, stuttered breath of air and clutch his chest painfully. Tobias hadn’t even paused to check on him. He had business to attend to.

Tobias stepped outside into the haze of Bliss, blinking his one eye in irritation and pushing his eyepatch up to wipe a gob of sweat from where the other one had once been. He hunted the apparitions that gathered around, ghostly white wolves, some of them real, some of them imagined.

“You’re a soldier, you do as you’re told,” Jacob was purring into the radio headset, buzzing in Tobias’ ear. “Just let go, you’ve served your purpose.” Tobias managed to destroy all of Jacob’s little gadgets, wolf beacons that spewed Bliss gas, and the sky cleared, allowing Tobias to see. Jacob’s position was a good vantage point, really. A great one, in fact, the tallest in the region. The only problem with being the tallest thing in the area is that everyone, _everyone_, could see you.

Darting behind a rock, Tobias unfolded the bipod of his massive rifle, far larger and more powerful than Jacob’s own. He squinted through his scope and saw Jacob there, his broad shoulders up against a boulder, his own eye to his scope, searching in vain for Tobias. Never bring a knife to a gun fight, and never, ever, bring an airman to a sniper contest. The special ops advanced sniper would win one hundred percent of the time. Jacob may have been a good shot, but he was not an elite Army sniper. Tobias had trained with the very best shooters in the world. Of the forty-two candidates who were in Tobias’ sniper school course, only he and one other graduated. He was the best of the best at recognizance, survival, and, of course, aim. No one in this county, except _maybe _Grace Armstrong could outshoot Tobias. Jacob certainly couldn’t.

Jacob had not even spotted him yet, was still rambling on about his purpose, and his tests and how weak and selfish Eli was. Tobias had to resist rolling his eye.

“You’re tougher than I thought…but killing me won’t change a goddamn thing. You think I give a shit if I die? That’s my purpose. I’d give my life for Joseph’s, and I do it gladly. I understand my role…I am his sacrifice, simple as that.” Tobias looked away from his scope, looked away from where Jacob was frantically searching for him, using his laser sight like a dumbass. Tobias knew exactly where he was, could end him at any moment, but those words, they sunk in deep. He knew that despair, knew that apathy. He knew what it was like to be indifferent to your own death.

Sighting back through his scope, Tobias considered for a moment, decided. If he squeezed the trigger right now, he would blow a hole in Jacob Seed’s forehead. He knew how it would look, how that big ginger head would snap back, how his eyes would bug out of their sockets, how his lungs would manage one last, surprised breath, having not gotten the memo yet that the brain was already mush. He didn’t squeeze the trigger. It was almost unsportsmanlike to do so now. He knew it would leave a bad taste in his mouth. Tobias thought that maybe he wouldn’t have to. All that coughing. That rough voice. Those blistered scabs and burns that still wept and bled even now. He recognized that. He let off one shot, right in the shoulder, heard Jacob cry out in agony and anger.

“That’s all, folks,” he murmured, knowing the injury wouldn’t kill Jacob, but it had to hurt like a son-of-a-bitch, and it would keep Jacob from being able to lift and aim his rifle effectively.

Packing his scope into his backpack and slinging his rifle over his back, Tobias began to work his way up the steep upwards jut of mountain that Jacob Seed was on top of. He heard the man screaming at the other Peggies, demanding they find the deputy. They would have a hard time, Tobias smirked, rubbing mud on his face to cover his stark white skin. He was wearing his own Army fatigues, much as Jacob still did. They were two peas in a pod really. But only one of them was about to die.

Crawling at some points on his belly, Tobias ended any wolves or Peggies he encountered and still he worked his way up, up, toward a furious Jacob who was spitting taunts at him from atop his perch. At last, there he was, his bright red hair sweaty and falling into his face instead of across the top of his head. He was still looking north, expected Tobias to be at the foot of the hill. He was not. Tobias, bigger and heavier than Jacob by five inches and fifty pounds, leapt like a hawk on a mouse, knocking Jacob’s rifle out of his hand and forcefully holding him in place, Tobias’ serrated hunting knife to Jacob’s neck. Huffing out a sigh, Tobias kicked Jacob in the backside, shoving him forward and away from him. Jacob turned with a snarl, his hand on his shoulder, his breathing rough, rougher than usual. He looked like a trapped animal, mostly because that was exactly what he was.

“Have a seat,” Tobias prompted, knife still in his hand. Jacob shook his head defiantly, but he did plop down on one of the rocks, panting with his mouth open, a rattle in his throat that Tobias hadn’t put there.

“My brother saw all this coming,” Jacob said finally, sounding tired. “I don’t know if he talks to God, that doesn’t matter. He was right. Humanity is once again,” he took a shuddering breath, “in crisis. It doesn’t matter what we build or achieve, we will always find a way,” he coughed and blood spluttered out of his mouth, soaked his thick pink bottom lip, “to break it down. Babylon, Rome, empires rise,” another cough, “empires fall. America, we’re no different.” Jacob gestured him closer, and Tobias complied, stepping forward, silent, listening. “We think we’re indestructible. World War Two, ‘War on Terror,’ we survived it…but it only brought us closer to the edge. And this is where we are, right here on schedule, just waiting on someone to push us, and, oh boy, have you _pushed_ us. You did everything he said you would do and you didn’t even know it. You had no fucking clue,” he took a labored breath. He made a squeaky, frightened sound in his throat, struggling to breathe through the mucus and blood that had gathered there from whatever was wrong with his lungs.

Tobias squatted down, handing him his water canteen. Jacob frowned, but took it, took a deep drink. The redhead chuckled bitterly.

“Didn’t take you as the kind to play with his prey before he killed it,” he told Tobias morbidly, his eyes bloodshot from coughing.

“That coughing, that ain’t from my bullet,” Tobias said matter-of-factly. “You’re, what, almost fifty? So Gulf War. Yeah, I thought as much.” Jacob coughed again, wheezing, holding his shoulder. Tobias had just winged the muscle there, but it was seeping blood through Jacob’s jacket, staining his 82nd Airborne patch. “Organophosphate pesticides got sprayed all around your camps routinely, right? Couldn’t have their killing machines contracting malaria or other shit. Just like the military,” Tobias mused. “They won’t give your enemy the courtesy of killing you, because they’ll make sure they do it first.” He laughed nastily and nodded as Jacob met his eyes, looking defeated and small. “‘Gulf War syndrome,’” Tobias continued. “I thought I recognized it. Those scabs and rashes, the bags under your eyes from no sleep. The coughing. The wheezing. The,” he chuckled, “_obvious_ neurocognitive effects on your psyche.” His hazel eye met Jacob’s clearly and he put a gentle hand on Jacob’s knee. “You didn’t ask for any of this. Not the war. Not the chemicals they soaked you in. Not the nightmare missions they sent you on. And you sure as shit didn’t ask for a brother who would take advantage of all of that.” Tobias took a deep breath, felt compassion for the enemy sitting in front of him, broken. He shook his head. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” he ground out. “And I don’t want to kill you,” he admitted.

“At this point,” Jacob held a fist up to cover his mouth as he coughed, splattering his hand with expelled blood, “it would be,” he coughed again, “a mercy killing.” Tobias gave a humorless laugh.

“I’ll kill you if you’ll kill me,” he suggested, half serious. Jacob gazed at him for a moment.

“What’s your damage?” the big red-head asked, obviously wanting an answer, even with the sarcastic wording.

“How long do you have?” Tobias quipped back. “Come on, you big bastard,” he said, lifting Jacob up to sounds of protest. “I’m not killing you today.” Jacob tugged away from him, caught himself, barely, on a boulder, giving an angry growl.

“I don’t want to live!” Jacob snarled. “Don’t you get that? It doesn’t matter what my brother says or does, it doesn’t matter who’s in charge, it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. Especially not me.” Tobias barked another laugh.

“Brother, I am not interested in a contest of who has it worse. But I ain’t killin’ one of my own,” he said firmly. “I’m a snake eater too, sir,” Tobias said, falling back into old habits. Jacob frowned.

“I ate more than snakes out there, kid,” he reminded him. Tobias nodded.

“You do what you can in the thick of it. Don’t change nothin’. I ain’t leavin’ you up here to die, and I sure as shit ain’t leavin’ you up here to try to kill me again. You come with me, or you come with me, those are your options, sir.” Jacob deflated even more, all the fight gone out of him.

They worked their way down the hill, Tobias carrying most of Jacob’s weight. They reached the bottom and Jacob had another coughing fit, pulled his arm off Tobias’ shoulder.

“I gotta take a knee, pup,” he told him, sitting heavily. Tobias again handed Jacob his water canteen and the man took it, took a deep drink and handed it back. The sky was beginning to darken as storm clouds moved over.

“Come on,” Tobias told him, yanking him back up, “Un-ass that rock and let’s go, soldier.” Jacob glared at him, but complied.

“Where…where are you taking me, kid?” Jacob asked tiredly as Tobias shoved him into the passenger’s seat of his banged-up pickup. He started the engine and put the truck into gear before he answered.

“To your bunker, sir. You’re gonna let my boy Pratt go. It ain’t negotiable.”

Two hours later, Pratt was free. An hour after that, Joseph released Jacob’s eulogy. An hour after that Tobias arrested the nutbag preacher. Two minutes after that, the first bomb dropped.

Tobias wasn’t an idiot. He uncuffed Joseph Seed, nearly earning himself a punch to the jaw from Whitehorse, but he managed to calm the man, gesturing toward at least three mushroom clouds to make his point. The law didn’t matter anymore.

“Your brother and sister are at the jail, Joseph,” he told the man quietly. “They’re alive.” Joseph’s face went very pale and then, before Tobias could do anything about it, the thin man had embraced him. He released him after a moment. Apparently he hadn't noticed that Tobias said "brother" not "brothers."

“May God go with you, Deputy,” Joseph said sincerely. He tore off in a pickup truck, and the rest of the residents of Hope County scattered, heading for bunkers and safe houses. Tobias calmly climbed into his pickup truck and drove to his trailer, cracking the hatch of his bunker open and sliding down the ladder to where he knew Jacob was staying. The older man had skeptically agreed to stay in Tobias’ bunker, was too tired and too injured to argue otherwise. It wasn’t so much that Tobias wanted the company, but putting Jacob Seed back with the cult felt kind of like taking an old stray dog to the pound instead of keeping it. He deserved a better place to die, a place where he could at least talk to someone who understood and felt his pain. Jacob and Tobias, they had an agony in their souls that transcended differences in opinion. An enemy could also be a friend when they shared that kind of damage.

“You sure you’re okay with me being here, pup?” Jacob asked him from where he lay resting on one of the bunkbeds in Tobias’ bunker, his breaths still coming ragged.

“‘Army of one,’ right? Hoo-ah,” Tobias said mockingly, but in a friendly tone.

“Back in my day it was ‘Be all you can be,’” Jacob responded dryly. The ground rumbled as more bombs fell. “Feeding my crippled ass is a waste of resources and you know it, kid,” Jacob said, glancing at the stocked shelves.

“I’m just fattening you up so I can eat you,” Tobias quipped, his mood oddly unaffected by the end of the world happening just outside. His world had already ended years ago, when his wife and kid had died. Jacob glared, said nothing else, but he reached in his pocket, pulled out a little familiar box.

The jingling, jolting notes of “Only You” poured out. Jacob waited expectantly for his violent death at Tobias’s hands. Instead, Tobias walked to the fridge and pulled out two beers, handing one to Jacob.

“Shut that shit off and have a beer, sir.” Jacob took it, looking annoyed and confused by the fact that the trigger hadn’t worked on Tobias. Realization flooded his wolfish features and he growled low in his throat.

“You son-of-a-bitch.” Jacob tossed his head back onto his pillow, staring up at the bunk above him. “It’s gonna be a long seven years.”


	2. It's Supposed to Say "Pride" not "Pry"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rook regales Jacob with the story of how he defeated his brother John.

“Get the fuck off of me! Get off me, you raging little asshole!” Tobias grabbed John by the front of his shirt as soon as he regained consciousness and the surprised herald tried to skitter backwards, but couldn’t – Tobias was holding his feet off the ground. Tobias looked down at his chest, feeling his broken nose throbbing. Across the right side of his chest the letters PRI were scrawled in an almost childish hand. The letters were bleeding both ink and blood. He scowled. “First of all, that’s not how you use a tattoo machine, you moron,” he snapped, giving John a little shake that made his teeth clatter together and his sunglasses nearly fall off the top of his greasy head. “Secondly, I thought you were all about consent? I didn’t want a fucking tattoo on my chest, especially not…whatever the fuck this is supposed to be.”

“I have to expose your sin,” John told him through clenched teeth. Tobias narrowed his eyes. With his two big buckteeth, it was almost cute when John bared his teeth. Too bad it made him look a little rodent-like as well. “It’s supposed to say ‘Pride,’ not,” John’s eyes flickered over his half-finished work in annoyance and he huffed, “‘Pri.’” Tobias snorted.

“Well, I guess that’s too fuckin’ bad, Johnny boy.”

“Unhand me, Deputy, or your friends die,” John threatened. Tobias set him back on his feet and neatened his collar for him calmly as though he were helping a friend straighten his tie before a wedding or a job interview.

John swallowed at the contact.

Rolling his eyes, Tobias leaned around the shorter man, saw the situation, saw the Peggies with Nick, Jerome and Mary May. He leaned in close to John’s face, his lips mere centimeters from John’s own. He saw the younger man’s eyes dilate and he chuckled, giving a charming smile. He knew John Seed wanted to fuck him. Sharky had said as much. He used it to his advantage. He was secure enough in his masculinity and his sexuality to get what he wanted from John – the safety of his friends. Tobias slid his left hand down the inside of John’s coat, stroking a muscular side and locating the gun he knew would be there. He slid the safety off, but then continued his right hand down John’s waist to his groin while simultaneously grabbing the gun with his left hand. John didn’t notice what Tobias’ left hand was doing. He was too distracted by Tobias’ right hand rubbing gently over his crotch. Tobias leaned in very close to John’s ear, looking at that tacky earring the dickbag wore.

“I can’t stay mad at you, John,” he whispered flirtatiously. “Why don’t you and I go finish up this tattoo somewhere private, and you let my friends go, hmm?” John looked at him, his breath going a bit ragged. Tobias could feel the beginnings of interest shift beneath his hand, but he was prepared to clench down on John’s testicles in a moment, if needed. He raised a brow and pasted on his best, most charming expression. “I won’t be able to…relax…if I know my friends are in danger, John,” he told him reasonably. John cleared his throat, flicked a dismissive hand at his men. Tobias knew he was the one John really wanted, the one John had to win over if he was going to “reach Eden’s Gate,” whatever the fuck that meant.

“Let them go,” John said, lust settling across his handsome features. “The deputy and I have some business to attend to.” Tobias waited until the Peggies had filed out of Jerome’s church, waited until his friends stood and shook off their bonds. He smiled at John again, hand still on his groin where he could feel that John was decidedly interested now. In an instant he had John’s nuts in a vice grip and he had pulled John’s own revolver out and had it aimed at him. John cried out in pain, a comical,

“Hhnngh,” sound that almost made Tobias lose his grip laughing at him. The look on John’s face could not be adequately described – some combination of horror, fear, anger, and embarrassment.

Jacob cackled as Tobias finished the tale.

“Well, that would explain why he didn’t want to explain to any of us how you managed to get away from him and two dozen of his best men,” Jacob roared, deeply amused. He sobered after a moment. “I thought he was dead when you shot him down out of that damn plane of his afterwards.” Tobias snorted.

“Oh ye of little faith,” he griped in a disappointed tone, pouring Jacob a glass of whiskey. “I am a very good shot. Only people I want dead die from my shots, Jacob. You oughta know that by now.” He looked significantly at Jacob’s shoulder. The ginger sniffed, but took the proffered whiskey.

“Hey, we gotta make this stuff last,” Jacob chided, sipping it anyway. Tobias shrugged.

“It’s the end of the world. Might as well enjoy it.”

“So. Would you really have gone farther than that?” Jacob asked, a bemused expression on his face.

“What, are you asking because you want to know if I would have sucked your little brother off in a church?” Tobias responded. Jacob reddened, spluttered. “Or are you asking because you’ve just realized you’re gonna be locked down here with another dude for the foreseeable future? Look, my view on it is it ain’t gay if the balls don’t touch,” Tobias assured him. Jacob laughed, not quite sure what to think of the deputy now that they had started becoming friends in the solitude of the bunker.

“Jesus Christ, kid, I don’t think I’ll be that desperate to get laid for a long time.” Tobias shrugged.

“Suit yourself but just don’t clog the shower drain jerkin’ off. And quit callin’ me ‘kid.’ I’m only nine years younger than you.” Jacob snorted, eyeing his unlikely companion.

“What about Faith?”

“Would I fuck her? Oh absolutely,” Tobias answered. Jacob threw the nearest object – a book – at Tobias’ head. It smacked him hard and he squawked, rubbing his temple.

“I meant how did you manage to catch her, nimrod.”

“Pass me that beef jerky and I’ll tell you.” Jacob tossed it to him, leaning back comfortably.

“It all started when I walked through some of those goddamn Bliss flowers and next thing I knew I was high as a fuckin’ kite, seeing all kinds of shit that wasn’t there and then…” The two stayed up late into the night as Deputy Rook regaled Jacob Seed with the tales of his exploits. Jacob started to drift off eventually and Tobias stood, grabbing a blanket and draping it over the older man. “Sleep well, you grouchy fuck,” he muttered half-affectionately, scrambling into his own bunk and closing his eyes. Maybe seven years wouldn’t seem so long after all.


	3. On the Seventh Day...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jacob tells Tobias the full story of what happened to him and Miller in the desert.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Violence  
TW: Cannibalism  
TW: Description of cannibalism

Jacob awoke with a gasp and a splutter, coughing and wiping water off his face. He stood with a roar, breathing hard, ready to hit someone or, better yet, kill someone. Tobias was standing with a dripping cup in his hand. Glaring at him, flicking drops of water from his soaked beard, Jacob clenched his teeth. 

“What the fuck, pup?” he snarled. Tobias blinked, shrugged.

“You were havin’ a nightmare. I sure as shit wasn’t gonna try to shake you awake.” Jacob scoffed, still irritated.

“And you couldn’t have just called my name, dumbass?” Tobias sobered.

“I did. You were screaming. Crying. Couldn’t hear me.” Jacob reddened, picked up a towel to finish wiping his face clean and to hide his embarrassment, realizing some of the wetness on his face was tears. “Wanna talk abou–”

“No.” Jacob shoved his way past Tobias, stepping into the small bathroom and shedding his clothes, letting lukewarm water pour over him in the meagre shower. He had glanced at the clock on his way to the bathroom, saw it was four in the morning. Might as well get up now that he was already awake and angry. His heart was still beating fast, both from the abrupt awakening and the dream. Hands. So many hands. Waving. Desperate. Still. Shaking himself, he rinsed the slick sheen of sweat off his body, stepping out into the main area of the bunker with a towel wrapped around his hips. Tobias was back to snoozing on his bunk, but he lifted his arm off his face when Jacob stepped in.

“You alright?” Jacob threw his towel across the bunker in irritation and rage.

“I’m fine, fucking leave me alone about it,” he snarled, ignoring his state of undress.

“Jesus, fine. But cover yourself up or I’m gonna get sunburn from the glow of your asscheeks.” Jacob glared at him for a moment, pulled out a pair of underwear and tugged them on, facing Tobias and crossing his arms over his bare chest.

“If you aren’t gonna suck it, then stop staring at my dick,” Jacob snapped. Tobias chuckled.

“Farthest thing from my mind, my dude. I was looking at that,” he pointed. “Been wondering about it for a while.”

“Yeah, well, keep wondering,” Jacob advised, pulling on his jeans to cover up the massive scar running up the inside of his thigh.

“You seriously gonna make me wonder for the next however long we’re down here? That looks like human claw marks, and that sure as shit is a human bite mark.”

“I said keep wondering, goddammit!” Jacob bit out, breathing hard.

“I guess Miller didn’t take too kindly to being eaten,” Tobias commented, stubborn. Jacob clenched his jaw so tightly he felt a filling crack.

“Don’t talk about things you don’t know about.”

“You told me plenty,” Tobias reminded him. Jacob turned, sat heavily on a chair.

“I didn’t tell you everything, pup. I want to keep it that way.”

“Suit yourself. But talking my issues out is the only thing that’s kept me sane. Well. Mostly sane. Out of the loony bin, anyway.” Jacob scowled.

“You aren’t going to let this go, are you?” Tobias met his eyes, deep amusement mingled with concern in his expression.

“Nope.”

“And why the fuck do you care so much about me all of the sudden, Deputy? You didn’t give a good goddamn when you walked in that chapel all those months ago.”

“You’re right. I didn’t. But then I heard you talk. I don’t disagree with you, Jacob. I never did, I just disagreed with your tactics. But I recognized those tactics. You and me, we share a common pain.”

“Oh shut the fuck up, pretty boy, I don’t want camaraderie with you, I don’t want to be ‘besties,’ I don’t even want to be alive right now, so how about you stop inflicting yourself on me and leave me be?”

“Because I care about what happens to you, you dumb asshole. Because you remind me of myself and I don’t want to end up in the same place. Because I figure if I can save you from yourself then I’ve got at least a fighting chance of saving myself.” Jacob glared at him for a long, long moment, leaning forward intently, malevolently in his chair like a wolf about to go for the jugular.

“And just what would you know about being me?” he snarled, voice low and dangerous.

“I’ll make you a deal. You tell me the rest of the story about Miller, and I’ll tell you my story in return,” Tobias offered, tapping his eyepatch.

“I don’t give a shit about your story, Tobias,” Jacob ground out through bared teeth. “And I don’t give a shit about you. Just so we’re clear.” Tobias’ face hardened and he clenched wads of sheet in his fists where he laid on his bunk.

“Crystal,” Tobias assured Jacob, rolling over.

\--------------------------------------------------

They ate in silence that afternoon, Jacob chewing thoughtfully and Tobias pointedly ignoring him, sitting on his bed instead of at the table. He hated eating anywhere near where he slept, but the size of his bunker and Jacob’s presence at the only table left him little choice. He finished his meal and put the MRE container in the trash compactor. It ran weakly. Must be dark and stormy outside. Would have to wait to run the motor the next morning. He glanced at his watch. Two in the evening. The day was dragging by without Jacob to talk to, but the older man had made his feelings on chitchat clear today. He was a man of many moods, usually ones on opposing ends of the pendulum to one another. He had occasional bad days where he was nasty, but today had been particularly bad since he had been awoken from what was clearly a horrifying dream. Next time Tobias would just plug his ears and let that red-headed fuckface suffer through the whole nightmare. Tobias picked up his e-reader, thankful he had the foresight to download literally thousands of books before the bombs had gone off.

“Whatcha readin’?” Jacob asked suddenly, though his tone was disinterested. He must be bored. Tobias glared at him over the top of the e-reader.

“_How to Lose Friends and Murder People_, what’s it to you? None of your goddamn business is what,” Tobias snapped. Jacob chuckled.

“Is that a real book?” he laughed. Tobias scowled, setting the e-reader down and sitting up.

“I’m reading _A Farewell to Arms_,” he said finally, taking a deep breath to calm his temper.

“Good choice,” Jacob murmured. “Read that one a few times when I used to spend nights in the city library.” Tobias didn’t take the bait, didn’t latch on to the obvious reference to Jacob’s time as homeless. “If you haven’t read _For Whom the Bell Tolls_, that’s a good one too.” Tobias glared daggers at Jacob before picking up the abandoned e-reader and continuing to read.

“I lied, before,” Jacob said after a long moment. Tobias ignored him, stubborn. “I told the story the way I knew would make me sound strong. I practiced it every morning in the mirror, used it to scare the most bullheaded men and women Joseph or John or Faith sent me. ‘On the seventh day,’” Jacob quoted himself softly, “my legs started to go all wonky.”

Tobias’ eyes shot up, latching onto Jacob, who sat in the chair, staring into space. Tobias sat the e-reader down, swallowed. “By the eighth day, the wolves were closing in. And Miller looked at me and he could tell we were as good as dead. And he accepted that. And in that acceptance came clarity. You see, he wasn’t just looking at me. He was looking at an opportunity. It wasn’t something that he wanted. It was something that he had to do.” Jacob met Tobias’ gaze intently. “He was the one who realized what needed to be done, but it was still _my_ test,” he told him.

\----------------------------------------

Jacob floundered weakly on the hot sand, his legs collapsing out from under his big frame. He coughed and spluttered as he caught a mouthful of sand, his arms too weak to catch him when he fell. He was no longer panting or sweating. That had stopped a while ago. Miller looked at him with an odd, predatory expression.

“You okay?” Miller asked mechanically.

“I don’t…I don’t think I can walk. I need a minute,” Jacob gasped out, trying and failing to get his legs under him. His hands were shaking as he reached one of them to shield his eyes from the setting sun.

“I’m sorry, brother,” Miller murmured as he approached. “This is the only way either of us gets out of here.”

“What?” Jacob asked hoarsely. A sudden hard blow smashed into the side of his head and his world went black. When he awoke, it was dark, the sun had set. He realized suddenly that his pants had been tugged off. He heard the sound of metal against rock and turned his head slowly, sluggishly toward the source of the sound. Miller was sharpening his knife against a rock. “What…” Jacob swallowed with a click, “What’re you doin’, Miller?” Miller stared at him, face emotionless.

“The only thing I can do, Seed. Only one of us is getting’ out of this fuckin’ desert alive.” He stalked toward Jacob, knife in hand. Jacob held a hand up in desperation, trying to ward Miller off.

“No. No, please,” he crackled out, throat like sandpaper. “Don’t do this. Don’t do this, Miller.” Miller grabbed him by the ankle, drug him close to a small fire he had built from the arid bushes that grew in occasional dots of life on the otherwise barren landscape.

“The weak have their purpose, Seed. I’ll tell them you died a hero.”

“Get off me, you bastard,” Jacob cried out, kicking weakly at Miller’s grip on his ankle with his free leg.

“Enough of that. It’s over, Seed.”

“No!” Jacob cried, wrestling the knife from Miller’s hand when he hovered over him. He was almost as weak as Jacob, though he had been doing a better job of hiding it. Jacob threw the knife, putting it out of reach. With a snarl, Miller raked nails hard down the inside of Jacob’s bare thigh. Jacob shrieked in agony as skin and muscle tore under Miller’s desperate scratching.

“You’re my sacrifice, Seed. I need you in order to live. I’m gonna see my family. I’m gonna see my brothers and my sister.”

“My brothers,” Jacob murmured weakly, a half-sob, “I haven’t seen my brothers. They’re adults now,” he mumbled, “Joseph…John,” he cried. A sudden surge of strength tore through him, and just in time too. Miller sank sharp white teeth into the meat of Jacob’s thigh, tugging and tearing the muscle there. Tears of pain watered in Jacob’s eyes as he cried out in pain. “You…you motherfucker! I will not die today,” he ground out, hands grasping for something, anything, to save himself with. The knife was well out of both of their reach, but there! His fingers stumbled over something hard and solid. A small, fist-sized rock. He wrested it from the sand and slammed it into the back of Miller’s head. Miller jerked back with a mouthful of Jacob’s leg clamped in his teeth. Jacob shrieked in pain again, raised the rock again, slammed it into the side of Miller’s head. He lifted and dropped his weary arm again and again and again until, at last, Miller slumped onto him, dead.

Too weak to push him off after the massive expenditure of energy, Jacob laid there, panting and sobbing softly. He couldn’t remember the last time he had cried, but it hardly mattered. He had no tears left to produce, so his cries were just little gasps that jerked his whole body as he laid there, exhausted and bleeding. The night grew cold, and finally Jacob summoned the strength to escape from beneath Miller’s heavy body. Using Miller’s knife, he did what was necessary. He cut, and sliced, and cooked thin pieces of meat over the small fire that still burned. He lapped thirstily at salty blood, swallowing thickly. It wasn’t water, and it made him feel nauseated, but it was better than dying. Wiping a blood-stained mouth, Jacob found his discarded clothing, pulled it back on before the tortuous sun rose again. His leg stung and ached where Miller had clawed and bitten it, but he could still walk. He would still walk.

He had to see his brothers again.

\--------------------------------------------------------

“Jesus Christ,” Tobias murmured. Jacob walked the to fridge, pulled out a beer, poured half of it in a glass, handed the other half in the bottle to Tobias, who took it gratefully.

“It wasn’t Jesus that got me out of that fuckin’ desert,” Jacob pontificated. “It was my own goddamn force of will. If I had it to do again, I would have killed Miller in a heartbeat, so don’t sit there thinking I’m some kind of tragic hero. I’m just a man who did what needed doing. I wanted to see my family again, and I did. Now, forgive me, but I doubt you have a story that can match mine,” Jacob finished, taking a gulp of beer. Tobias sat very quietly, sniffled, wiped his mouth and cleared his throat, his one eye a little misty.

“No. No, I probably can’t beat it as far as sheer intense levels of fucked-up goes. But,” his eye flicked to Jacob’s, “at least you got to see your family again. I gotta take a piss. I’ll tell you my story when I get back.”

“Oh, because you have to go so far,” Jacob snarked as Tobias took the twenty steps to the bathroom.

“Fuck you, shitweasel. I’ll be back in a minute.”


	4. It Makes You Human

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tobias tells Jacob about his own traumatic past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I strongly advise you to take the trigger warnings very seriously. There is a description of a suicide by drug overdose and it gets pretty messed up. Do not read if you are in a bad place. If anyone needs it: https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
> 
> TW: Heavy references to alcoholism  
TW: Drunk driving  
TW: Drug use  
TW: Drug overdose  
TW: Minor character suicide/murder
> 
> \-------------------------------------------------

This was not how this was supposed to happen. It was the opposite of how it was supposed to happen. They were supposed to show up, prim and proper in their dress uniforms and knock on her door. Wendy would answer, would start to cry, knowing there is only one reason a soldier comes to the door when your husband is in the military. They’d leave that folded flag with her, offer condolences. Emily would tug on her mother’s shirt, not understanding, not knowing why Daddy wasn’t coming home. That was how it was supposed to work.

Instead, Tobias had been pulled aside by his commanding officer. He wasn’t even overseas yet. He had mostly joined the Army so he could afford to go to college, to give his wife and kid a better life. His C.O. was talking, but he was having trouble focusing, was blinking hard, breathing slowly.

“…appears that the driver was intoxicated…they tried everything they could but your wife and daughter…I’m so sorry, Private Rook…time off, of course…fly you back to Dallas for the funerals…see where you’re stationed after…you can go to your quarters…will send the chaplain to speak with you…whenever you’re ready, son…” His commanding officer’s voice faded in and out of his hearing as a shrill, piercing squeal rang through his mind as though he had been struck or stood too close to a flashbang.

Tobias didn’t really remember it happening, but apparently he punched the chaplain they sent to ‘comfort’ him. There was no comfort to be had from a God he wasn’t convinced existed. He had finished his first tour despite the death of his family. He had convinced the military doctors he was fine, he was recovered, he had accepted his wife and child’s death.

When he got home, Jacob tracked the bastard responsible down, followed him to his local bar. He was a peon for an oil company. He had broken his arm driving home from a conference a couple years ago, he told Tobias when he asked about the man’s shortened, mangled arm, covered in scars from staples and metal braces and many surgeries. Bad wreck.

“That’s how I got these scars, see?” the guy told him, rolling his sleeve up higher.

“Yeah. That’s pretty wicked,” Tobias had told him, sipping his beer casually, smiling easily as though he was glad to make a new acquaintance. Now that he was here, he didn’t know what he wanted to do. Didn’t know how to proceed. “How’re you, you know, already out of prison?”

“First offense,” the guy told him, smirking, missing that Tobias had never asked how he knew he got prison time because of a wreck. “Got out early for good behavior.”

“Hmm. Good behavior. That justice system, huh?”

“Yeah, man. I got lucky,” he mentioned offhandedly, drunk enough to let it slip out in a too-casual tone. He didn’t even sound guilty.

“Lucky you,” Tobias agreed. He took another drink of his beer, clenched his teeth so hard he thought they’d break, clamped his hand on the pint glass so hard it _did_ break, splattering glass and beer every where.

“Oh, shit, man, you okay?” his new acquaintance asked, wiping spilled beer off him as the bartender approached with a towel.

“Must’ve had a crack,” Tobias forced out, trying to control his breathing. The bartender frowned a bit at the odd, struggling series of expressions that were crossing Tobias’ face.

“You got a wife? Kids?” Tobias asked the man after the mess was cleaned up and he had been handed another beer.

“Nah. Never found anybody to put up with me. I’ve got no family. No one who gives a shit when I get home,” his acquaintance laughed. “You?”

“Nope,” Tobias said. “No wife. No kid. That’s why I’m shippin’ out again, you know? Nothin’ keeping me here.”

“Oh? You a military guy, huh?”

“Yeah. Yeah. Army. Wanna be a sniper. I ship out next week, second tour.”

“Well, let me buy you a drink, then.”

“Ah, you don’t have to do that,” Tobias muttered.

“Nah, I do. You’re a hero. Servin’ our country. Hey! Another one over here,” he demanded of the bartender, who shot him a glare but complied.

Tobias, unsure what he wanted, unsure if he wanted to stomp this man to death, or if he wanted to walk away and never see him again, sat next to him shooting the shit and drinking until last call. Tobias had paced himself, stayed quite sober and swapped to soda water hours before as he watched his companion get more and more drunk, watched him fumble in his pocket for his keys as the bartender ushered them out.

“Man, didn’t you get a DUI?” Tobias asked him as they made their way into the parking lot. The guy shrugged.

“‘S fine. I’m fine,” he insisted.

“You’re too drunk to drive, man,” Tobias pressed, voice low. The guy stared at him lopsided for a moment, one eye half shut.

“Ffffuck offfff” he slurred out. “It’s fine. I’m fine,” he insisted, putting his key into the lock on his car door after poking around it about fifteen times.

Feeling nauseated, Tobias walked up, not sure if he was about to clock the guy, or push him, or kill him, or stop him from driving. He decided on the last one. He put a hand on the guy’s shoulder. He peered at Tobias bleerily.

“Let me drive you home, man. Wouldn’t want to kill anyone else, would you?” he asked, his voice a frighteningly steady whisper. The man turned to face Tobias abruptly.

“How’d you know I killed someone?” he whispered, slightly more sober than he had been a moment before.

“Call it a good guess,” Tobias hissed. “Maybe _I got lucky_. Get in my truck, you piece of– you idiot,” he corrected, calming himself. “I ain’t lettin’ you drive like this.” The guy shrugged, too drunk to realize the danger he was in.

“Whatever.” He climbed into Tobias’ truck.

“So.” Tobias locked the doors of his truck. “Where to, Jermaine?”

“How do you know my name?” Tobias laughed, started his truck and beginning to pull out of the nearly empty parking lot.

“You told me. How else would I know?” Jermaine looked at him uncomfortably for a moment, processed the information and then shrugged again.

“Oh. Right.”

“What’s your address, Jermaine?” He gave it and Tobias turned right. He already knew where Jermaine lived. He’d known for weeks. He knew the way there by heart. He pulled into Jermaine’s driveway, unlocked the doors of his truck. “Don’t suppose I could come inside to take a piss?” Tobias asked casually.

“Sure, man. No problem.” Jermaine struggled with his keys again until Tobias took them, let them in. “This, uh, this isn’t some kinda gay thing, right? Cuz I don’t swing that way.” Tobias laughed a deep belly laugh.

“Shit, man, you’re gonna make me piss myself. No. I just need to take a leak.” Jermaine nodded.

“Third door to the right.” Tobias made his way to the bathroom. He opened the cabinet door, found what he knew would be there – a prescription for oxycodone and a bottle of aspirin. He pocketed the pills, took a piss, washed his hands. He stepped out to find Jermaine sprawled on his couch, already in a near-stupor. Making his way into the kitchen, Tobias found a fridge full of beer and multiple bottles of liquor out on the counter. He grabbed a few bottles of beer, a bottle of whisky. Tobias sat the pills on the coffee table when he returned to the living room, nudging Jermaine with a booted foot.

“What the _fuck_, dude? You stealin’ my shit?”

“Nah, you seem to like partying, figured I’d bring the refreshments.” Tobias’ eyes were bright with hatred, his hands trembled with rage, but his host was oblivious. Jermaine chuckled.

“Hand me one, will you?”

“Just one? Come on, man, you can party harder than that. Here.” Tobias handed him a large handful of pills. “You’ll be fine.” Too drunk for good judgment, Jermaine took the pills, swallowed them, washing them down with a beer than Tobias handed him. It was almost too easy. Jermaine’s eyes went a little distant and Tobias nudged his beer.

“We’re having a good time, right? Drink up.”

“You seem like a cool dude,” Jermaine slurred, laughing giddily as the drugs hit his system like a freight train. Tobias had mixed aspirin in with the oxycodone and Jermaine was on a short trip to a long ending. Already his breathing was slowing. He was fighting hard to stay conscious. Tobias flipped on the television. A formulaic cop show was on. Jermaine watched it dully.

“H-hey, man, I’m feelin’ kinda sick.” Tobias looked at him mildly, went to the kitchen and brought him a glass of water. It probably wouldn’t do much at this point. Jermaine took a sip, set it down, picked up a beer instead.

“I think you need to just party through the pain, man,” Tobias told him, watching him like a hawk. Jermaine nodded.

“Hand me some more of those. I can still feel my face,” he giggled slowly. Tobias obliged, dumping pills in his hand, which he tipped into his mouth. Tobias watched beer dribble out of the side of Jermaine’s mouth. Jermaine was staring at the beer bottle in his hand, now empty.

“Switch to something stronger?” Tobias asked, holding up the bottle of whisky. Jermaine stared at the bottle for a long, long moment, took it finally after hazy consideration.

“I didn’t mean to kill ‘em, you know? That woman. Her kid,” he murmured suddenly. “I thought about killing myself. Thought maybe that would make the universe even. But I don’t know. I’ve had a hard life,” he went on. “My dad beat me when I was a kid…”

“I don’t give a shit about your daddy issues, Jermaine.” Jermaine’s eyes flickered up.

“What?”

“I don’t care about your daddy issues. I care about those people you killed. I loved them.”

“What’d you say your name was?” Jermaine frowned, struggling to stay conscious. He took another drink to steady himself and Tobias smiled a Cheshire smirk, knowing it would all be over soon.

“Tobias,” he said. “Tobias Rook.”

“‘Rook’?” Jermaine asked, tone horrified as his brain, slowed by both drugs and alcohol, chugged away, trying to connect the dots. “I’m sorry,” Jermaine slurred out after a moment when realization struck. He started to cry.

“No. No, you’re not. And that’s the problem.” Hissing out a terrified breath, Jermaine slung the cap off the whisky bottle and brought it to his lips. He chugged the liquor down and then hacked, coughing roughly at the burn. “You deserve worse punishment than a couple of years in prison and some community service, you fucking monster,” Tobias growled. “If I could tear you limb-from-limb I would, but I’ve got places to be. Good news is no one will miss you. This is all you’ve ever been, Jermaine. _Weak. _You could have been great. You could have been someone, but instead you became a drunk. You _killed my wife and my child._” Jermaine’s bloodshot eyes stared at Tobias drearily. “And nothing changed. You didn’t learn anything, didn’t grow, didn’t try to be a better man. You’re just meat. Nothin’ more.” They sat in lugubrious silence for a long moment, Jermaine with tears dripping slowly down his cheeks.

“My stomach’s startin’ to hurt,” he mumbled, his voice drowsy. He wiped a tired hand over his face, smearing the tears that fell there.

“I bet it is,” Tobias told him coldly, holding out the last of the pills in the bottle enticingly. Jermaine took them, hands trembling. He spilled half the pills trying to get them to his mouth, but there were still enough to finish the job. He swallowed them, washing them down with whiskey.

“I’m sorry,” Jermaine said insistently, slouching into his couch, breaths slow and raspy.

“I don’t care,” Tobias told him. He used vodka from the kitchen to wipe every surface he had touched, ignoring the slowly dying murderer in the living room. He wiped the doorknob last, peering in at Jermaine one last time. “Burn in hell, you monster,” he hissed, and closed the door behind him, pulling away and driving home in ear-shattering silence.

Jacob stared at Tobias for a long moment. Tobias took a shuddering breath, his eye swimming with tears.

“The next week I shipped out. I never told anyone what happened that night. I never bothered to check obituaries or anything. No one ever asked me about it, I never got any warrants for my arrest, so maybe the dude didn’t even die, or maybe police didn’t suspect murder if he did. It’s not something I’m proud of. At all. If I had it to do over, I never would have followed him. Or maybe I would have, maybe I would have gotten him some help. I don’t know. The point is, the ends didn’t justify the means. I wanted justice, but that wasn’t the way to get it. It was wrong, and I’ll have to live with it until the day I die.” Jacob was still just staring. “Well? Say something,” Tobias ordered, his usually cool exterior cracking with worry.

“I’m just thinking how well you would have fit into our family,” Jacob told him finally. “John killed his adoptive parents. Joseph killed his child because she was born premature and was in pain, kept alive with tubes and pumps. ‘Failure to thrive,’ the doctors called it. Joseph called it ‘suffering’ and doled out his own judgment.” Jacob’s blue eyes flicked up to meet Tobias’. “I burnt down our foster parents’ house because they abused my brothers. I could go on, but I think you probably get the point. Committing an evil act for the sake of good is a…complicated thing. But doing an evil thing doesn’t necessarily make you an evil person, Rook, especially if you’re doing it for your family,” Jacob murmured.

“Oh? And what _does_ it make you?” Tobias asked, on edge. Jacob chuckled humorlessly.

“It makes you human, pup. It makes you human.”

Tobias didn’t have a response for that.


	5. The Breath of Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tobias worries for Jacob's health.

There was silence in the bunker. Or, at least, there was until Jacob started having another of his massive coughing fits. He was leaning forward with his hands propping him up on the kitchen countertop, gasping for breaths between the coughs, no longer covering his mouth with a hand because oxygen was already hard enough to come by without anything to impede its entrance into his desperate mouth and lungs. Blood splattered the countertop, and the wall behind it, as well as the microwave and the sink. Tobias said nothing. He got up, pulled out a glass and poured water into it.

Jacob finally stopped coughing, panted, his head bowed deeply between his shoulders. They made a point of not touching one another – the bunker was small enough without physical contact between them, but Tobias remembered when his daughter had caught a bad case of the flu, and the parent in him couldn’t stand it anymore. He reached a hand up gently and put it on Jacob’s shoulder. The fact that the man didn’t shake it off immediately spoke volumes about how he felt. His breaths were rattly and wet and Tobias was worried. What the fuck was he going to do if this big fucker died in here? Jam him in the trash compactor piece by piece? Eat him? He shuddered at that thought, much as they might joke about it, the thought of it sickened him.

Tobias didn’t bother asking if Jacob was alright. He already knew he’d be answered with glowering silence, a plethora of curses, or a fist to the nose.

Finally, Jacob shifted away from him, forcing his hand off his shoulder. He wiped his mouth tiredly, turning around and leaning back against the cabinets, tilting his head up and sighing with exhaustion. Tobias surveyed him for a moment, taking in his enemy turned kind-of-friend. He was pale, paler than he had been before the bombs dropped, anyway. His skin was pallid, covered in a thin sheen of sweat and droplets of blood stained around his mouth and on his lips, painting him a garish figure in the harsh fluorescent lights of the bunker. His carrot red hair had grown longer, poking out at every angle from the sides and back of his head. The top had grown just long enough to be pulled back into a ponytail, which Jacob did begrudgingly. He threatened to cut it all off with scissors, but had never actually bothered. Tobias cursed himself for forgetting to store a pair of trimmers in his bunker. Of all the stupid, inconsequential things he might have forgotten, that one had irritated him the most. Both he and Jacob were sporting full beards, though Jacob’s was sparser than his own due to burns. Sheer laziness kept them both from dealing with their hair with the scissors Tobias kept in one of the drawers.

They had been down here just shy of a year, and still they moved around one another cautiously, still both convinced that the other was planning their murder, not knowing that they both cared deeply that the other one stay alive until they could leave this cramped, awful space. Truth was, they both recognized the need for companionship and for someone, anyone, to talk to. They had, over the course of the year, shared their deepest, darkest secrets with one another. They left the door to the bathroom open when they showered or shit or pissed, not because they were married or anything, but because, when cut off from the entire world, any amount of separation from the only other human being you know for certain is alive is utterly unbearable. Which is why Tobias was worried anytime Jacob’s coughing got worse. He knew it was a symptom of exposure to God-only-knew how many chemicals in war, but it scared the shit out of him to think of being down here alone.

Taking a deep gulp of water, Jacob wiped his mouth, smearing blood across his arm and his face.

“Here,” Tobias said softly, taking a rag and wetting it, wiping Jacob’s face for him as he simply slumped against the cabinets, utterly exhausted. Jacob’s eyes were filled with fire and irritation at being babied, but he was clearly too tired to fight it. Tobias wiped his face, then got another rag to wipe the countertop and everywhere else the blood had splattered. “That’s getting worse,” he told Jacob, stating the obvious. Jacob cleared his throat, spat in the sink, thick phlegm with a stain of crimson blood splatting into the stainless steel.

“It flares up sometimes. Humidity’s pretty low down here,” he forced out, voice hoarse and painful. He swallowed with a wince and click, which made Tobias shove the water glass into his hand again.

“Drink,” Tobias ordered.

“Who’s in charge of who here, pup?” Jacob asked dryly.

“I think we established that a while ago,” Tobias said with a smirk. Jacob grinned, a few of his teeth stained around their gumline with blood. Tobias frowned. “I’m worried about you.”

“Oh, well, thanks, Mom,” Jacob told him, dragging himself off of the countertop he was leaning against and sitting heavily on his bed.

“I’m serious, Jacob. I don’t think the oven’s big enough to fit your entire body when you die. I’ll have to cook you in the frying pan, piece by piece. It’ll take forever.” Jacob glared.

“That is _not_ funny,” he said for the ten-thousandth time as Tobias brought up cannibalism. That was fine, Jacob made plenty of jokes about Tobias drugging him or roofieing him or killing him in his sleep. It was kind of their thing, an odd, almost antagonistic form of camaraderie that allowed them to emotionally distance themselves from one another and discussions of losing each other.

For instance, Jacob would say, “You know I’ll miss you when I get out of here. Or I would if you didn’t drug my MREs to kill me first.” To which Tobias would respond with something like, “If I drug you to kill you, then I can’t safely eat you, you know that, Jake’n’Bake,” he'd say with a smirk. “I figured your shitty cooking will kill you long before a poisoned MRE would anyway.” Then they would stare at one another long and hard, their gazes going distant until one or the other of them changed the subject. They knew, ultimately, that if they survived long enough to leave the bunkers that they would likely go their separate ways. Little did the other know, they had both realized they didn’t want that anymore. Even after only a year, they had bonded in a way that scared the shit out of both of them. It wasn’t romantic. It was something deeper. It was a brotherhood forged in mutual pain and the end of the world.

“We need to have a plan, pup,” Jacob said finally, still breathing a little harder than he normally would, each breath coming with a small rasp deep in his throat.

“No,” Tobias said, shaking his head adamantly. “You’ll be fine.” Jacob huffed a painful laugh, which made him cough again.

“I haven’t been fine in years, kid. I think the last time I was fine, I was still in my momma’s belly.” He chuckled darkly. “I think that’s the last time I got a good night’s rest too.”

“What, room service didn’t bring you that extra down pillow you ordered?” Tobias snarked. Jacob eyed him.

“Naw, and my roommate snores like a woodchipper.” Tobias grinned.

“Guilty as charged. Look, uh, I can sleep during the day, let you get some better sleep,” he offered. Jacob rolled his eyes.

“Quit treatin’ me like an invalid, Rook.” Sighing, Tobias nodded.

“Well, as far as humidity goes, I wouldn’t mind if it were a little higher. I can boil some gray water from the tank under the hood and we can turn down the air circulator. Might help.” Jacob shrugged.

“It’s your bunker, kid.”

“No, it’s our bunker.”

“Since when?” Jacob scoffed, face cautious at the potential meanings of that sentence. Tobias met his gaze steadily.

“Since you agreed to stay with me instead of your brothers. You know we never did talk about why that is?” Jacob, as usual, avoided the subject.

“I’m gonna hit the hay,” he said softly, tugging his jeans off.

“You know you really don’t have to wear pants in here. It’s just us,” Tobias pointed out. Jacob grinned, showing big canine teeth amid the sneering smile.

“I’m in enough danger of you roofieing me without giving you more temptation, pup,” he teased.

“That isn’t funny,” Tobias responded automatically. He generally wandered around the bunker in nothing but boxer briefs and a t-shirt. It’s amazing how little time it takes to lose interest in wearing clothing if no one _makes_ you wear clothing. It made Tobias think of Sharky and wonder if he had survived the bombs. He hoped so. He was a weird dude, but he deserved better than the life he’d been dealt. Come to think of it, that applied to a lot of people from this county. Sighing, Tobias flipped the lights off and picked up his e-reader, sitting at the dining room table, the glow of the screen illuminating his face.

Really, Tobias couldn’t help himself. His heart was in his throat each time Jacob’s breathing slowed until it finally found a slow, steady rhythm in sleep. Even then, there were occasional pauses in his breathing, little snuffling sounds as he cuddled into his pillow or adjusted his blanket. In those moments Tobias would watch him like a hawk, making sure he was okay, making sure he drew another breath before he went back to reading Steinbeck’s _East of Eden. _He forced himself to stay awake, forced himself to listen intently for Jacob’s breaths, to occasionally look, using his screen for light, to see Jacob’s big chest expanding and contracting. It was like when his daughter was an infant. Many nights he would crawl out of bed, even when she hadn’t cried to awaken him and his wife. He would sneak into her room to watch her breathe, to make sure he hadn’t forgotten a blanket or toy in her crib that might smother her in her sleep. Tobias would reassure himself of her life by watching those tiny lungs work. A tear slipped down his cheek and he wiped it roughly away, taking a shuddering breath. Jacob grunted in his sleep, huffing and mumbling something before turning over and relaxing again.

When Jacob woke in the morning and started making a sparse breakfast for them both, he found Rook sleeping at the dining room table, dark bags under his eyes. Jacob dropped the metal plate sharply in front of Tobias, making him jump awake at the sudden sound. For an instant he looked panicked, appeared to be fumbling for a weapon that was not there, but then he came truly awake and glared at Jacob in irritation.

“I don’t appreciate being stared at all night, pup. Gave me the heebie jeebies.”

“Forgive me for being concerned for your health.”

“Oh yeah, and why is that?”

Tobias bit back the _‘Because you’re my friend and I care about you and I don’t want you to die’_ that was on the tip of his tongue and instead declared, “Because I don’t want to spend a decade down here with your smelly corpse, obviously.” Jacob chuckled.

“Eat your breakfast and take a nap.”

“Who’s in charge down here?” Tobias retorted, the corner of his mouth lifting.

“Right now? Me. Eat. Sleep. I’m fine.”

When Tobias awoke from his nap, it was to the sound of Jacob collapsing heavily to the bunker floor, pale-faced and unconscious.


	6. An Admission of Guilt

“Jacob! Jacob! Oh God, oh shit,” Tobias murmured, putting his arms under Jacob’s armpits and pulling him up into his lap. The man was damp with sweat and was trembling, a full-body shiver running through him despite the fact that he was burning up. Holding a hand to Jacob’s wet forehead, Tobias realized his body temperature had sky-rocketed. “Hey, hey,” he called, tapping his hand against Jacob’s cheek to try to wake him, but he got no response. The man was completely limp, dead to the world, but he was, thankfully, still breathing. “Come on, man, don’t do this to me. Come on.”

Tobias lifted Jacob in a kind of princess carry, muscles straining. Jacob was smaller than Tobias, sure, but not by much. He was still a big motherfucker, Tobias thought, straining with effort as he carried his roommate – his friend – down the hall to the bathroom. He stripped Jacob’s jeans and t-shirt off and turned the cold water on full blast in the shower. The stream beat down on the both of them. Tobias shivered from cold, Jacob from illness.

“Come on, Jacob, please don’t die on me. Come on, you stubborn asshole, wake up,” Tobias plead, directing the water to Jacob’s armpits, groin and chest.

To be alone again...Utterly, mercilessly alone, his last friend dead and with no way to bury him…the thought was horrifying. Tobias’ breath hitched as the water beat down on them both. He kept up a constant litany of “please, please, please,” as he sat, Jacob limp and unmoving in his lap, his own clothes pasted to his body with frigid water. He would lose his mind, he realized, or he would have to end it. He wouldn’t be able to stand living anymore.

After so many years being alone, being friendless, his family dead and obligations the only thing that forced him to interact with other human beings, Tobias realized he could not abide the thought of Jacob leaving him. They were one soul split in two, tormented and broken, but healing, finally, brothers brought together. Peace and companionship had been dangled in front of their noses; Tobias couldn’t bear to have it snatched away now. He cried out angrily, staring up at the ceiling and cursing the unseen God he had grown to hate. _“Please,”_ he begged. It was the first time in years he had prayed. It might have been the first time in his life that he meant it, might have been the first time he had offered true supplication to a God who had hurt him so badly so many times. “You shat me out into this world with assholes for parents,” he ground out, his voice soft and bitter. “You took my wife. You took…” he gasped for breath, “you took my daughter…you bastard. You owe me. You owe me!” he screamed, eyes wild and jaw clenched in righteous fury. “Please,” he choked out, his voice a pained whisper.

At last, Jacob’s eyes flickered open, their whites bloodshot and their pupils dim.

“Looks like…” Jacob took a rough breath, “your poison finally got me,” he joked tiredly. Tobias pulled him close, ignoring how soaked his clothes were, ignoring how fucking cold he was. Jacob was still alive.

“That shit is not funny,” he forced out, realizing suddenly that he was crying as he held Jacob’s back close to his chest, “There’s not nearly enough room in the fridge for all this meat,” he finished with a half-sob, half-laugh. Jacob chuckled, one hand going up to hold Tobias’ arm where it was pressed across his chest. Jacob weakly surveyed his state of undress.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you saw me as a different kind of meat, Rookie. It’s customary to buy a guy a drink first,” he growled. Tobias chuckled.

“Shut up, you idiot.”

“Prove me wrong, why else would you need a cold shower?” Jacob continued, smirking mischievously, but his voice was still exhausted, his throat rough. Tobias laughed again, just glad Jacob was awake and talking.

“You got me, I just can’t get enough of that glow-in-the-dark soulless ginger skin.” Jacob chuckled roughly, leaning back heavily on Tobias, who switched the water off.

“I’m tired,” Jacob told him, breathing deeply. “And I’m cold,” he griped.

“Can you stand?” Jacob shook his head, his cheeks reddening at the admission.

“I don’t think so, kid. Sorry.” Tobias said nothing, just grabbed a towel, gently drying Jacob off. He could tell Jacob was truly exhausted – the man offered no resistance as Tobias dabbed water from his shoulders, his chest, his arms. He even tolerated a quick rub of the towel to his tangled orangey-red hair.

“Here,” Tobias encouraged, lifting him to his feet. Jacob wobbled, legs dangling and Tobias realized that he wasn’t lying about being unable to stand. He couldn’t get his feet under him. “Sorry about this,” Tobias said, squatting down and lifting Jacob in a fireman’s carry, flopping him onto his bunk after stripping off his soaked underwear and helping him pull on fresh ones. Tobias got Jacob a glass of water, which he swallowed greedily, choking once or twice as he guzzled the cold liquid down. Wordless, Tobias warmed a can of chicken noodle soup and, ignoring Jacob’s venomous glare, helped him eat it after he had put on fresh clothes of his own. Jacob looked drowsy now, but his color had returned. Still, he was shivering.

“Are you cold or hot?” Tobias asked.

“I’m fuckin’ freezing, kid,” Jacob admitted, again going red, as though an uncontrollable illness was somehow a personal weakness. After a moment, Tobias was decided. He nodded and crawled into the bed with Jacob. “The fuck you doin’, soldier?” Jacob asked him faintly, but with suspicion staining his tone.

“I’m making my move,” Tobias joked, but all he did was pull Jacob into his front and drape another blanket over both of them. He had brought his e-reader with him into the bed and began to read casually, sparing one hand to flick through the pages. Jacob relaxed once he realized Tobias was simply offering body heat, pressing his back against Tobias’ warm chest.

“Why’re you doing this, pup?” Jacob asked, frowning, not understanding why his enemy would offer him this kind of brotherly intimacy, this kind of care.

“Shut the fuck up, I’m reading.”

“Pup.” Tobias huffed out a sigh.

“Because, much as I hate to admit it, you’ve become my friend, Jacob Seed. More than that, you’ve become my brother. And I don’t want to lose you. I want to help you.” Jacob hummed.

\---------------------------------

“Why don’t you get a job, you sack of shit?” Jacob didn’t answer. He’d heard it before. He’d tried answering, both with words, or with fists. The first usually got him run off from a comfortable place to sleep. The second generally got him a night in jail and a half-warm, mediocre meal for his trouble. It was always tempting to respond with fists, but no bed or meal was worth losing his freedom.

He was sitting just outside an old pizza place where he was occasionally given scraps by a kind young employee, like a dog. Bundled in his jacket and a dull brown blanket, he just wanted to mind his own business and be left the fuck alone. He had no sign, no cup. He wasn’t asking for handouts. Like a wolf that has haphazardly wandered into a human populated area, he was only passing through.

“Hey, I’m talking to you, I said why don’t you get a job?” the man demanded, his face a snarl of indignance and judgment. Jacob barely offered him a glance.

“You don’t want to start shit with me, pup,” Jacob told him, hands still in his pockets, shoulders still rounded casually.

“Are you _threatening_ me?” the snotty little man accused. Jacob rolled his eyes, and, slowly, unfurling like a snake, he stood to his full height, towering above the smaller man, who paled.

“No.” He snatched the man by his collar, bringing his face closer to the other man’s menacingly. “_Now_ I’m threatening you. Leave me the fuck alone, or else.”

“Hey, let go of me!” Jacob obliged, but stared the guy down, lip curled in disgust. Cowed, the man took off, giving Jacob a nasty look over his shoulder as he fled. Sighing, Jacob sat back down. He didn’t feel like explaining to the kid that he couldn’t get a job at a restaurant because of his open wounds. He couldn’t keep a job working retail, because he “intimidated customers.” He couldn’t get a job doing manual labor because occasionally he would have coughing fits that put him out of commission for a few minutes at least. It made him a liability, he had been told. He couldn’t get a job anywhere, now. The PTSD and his other health problems were too much, and, as a final kick in the proverbial balls, he couldn’t get a job now because he didn’t have a home, didn’t have any permanent address, didn’t have a bank account. Can’t get a home without a job, can’t get a job without a home. The system was rigged against him and people like him from the onset. He coughed, a hacking bark that brought up phlegm and blood. He was getting pneumonia again, he could feel it.

It was almost dark. Not enough time left to walk to the veteran’s hospital for cheap antibiotics, and he didn’t have enough change for the bus. He would have to go tomorrow. He didn’t like going to the veteran’s hospital. They always wanted to shunt him to the veteran’s center, where he was catalogued like property among other broken souls. He preferred sleeping outside to sleeping in what was, essentially, a warehouse for destroyed humans. He could make his own way.

“What’ll it be tonight, friend?” the pizza parlor employee asked, flipping the open sign to closed. “I’ve got cheese, pepperoni, chicken, meat lover’s…?

“Whatever’s convenient,” he told the guy with a small, grateful smile. Daniel was his name? No, David.

“Back in a second,” David told him. When he returned with his keys and his bookbag, he also carried a pizza box, which he handed Jacob. Inside were two pieces of each of the kinds he had listed. Jacob chuckled.

“Thank you.”

“They just make us throw it away at the end of the day anyway. Have a good night,” he told him, frowning a little, looking distressed, as he always did when he told Jacob good night. “Do you…do you have someplace to sleep, man? Someplace safe, I mean?”

“I’m fine,” Jacob promised.

“Hey, man, if you ever need some good news…”

“I ain’t interested in finding Jesus, kid,” Jacob cut him off dryly. David chuckled lightly, not put off by Jacob’s gruffness.

“There’s a warehouse up the road. The Father…his message, it’s really encouraging. Might help someone like you. Sure helped me,” David told him, lifting a sleeve to reveal long-healed track marks.

“The Father?” Jacob asked skeptically. David shrugged.

“His name’s Joseph, but we all call him Father. You should check it out. He preaches everyday at eight in the morning and five in the evening. Take care, man.”

“Yeah…yeah, you too,” Jacob told him absently, his face gone pale. That name...Joseph. And…John… His heart ached at the remembered names. He picked idly at the pizza, chewing thoughtfully as painful memories of childhood haunted him, making him lose his appetite, making swallowing hard past the lump in his throat.

Jacob wasn’t surprised when he heard the footsteps. Nothing surprised him anymore. He knew the depths of man’s evil. He was only surprised it hadn’t happened sooner in the evening. The first blow caught him in the shoulder, splattering his pizza across the dirty sidewalk. The second caught him in the head, and he shook it dazedly, rising to his feet and holding up fists to protect himself. The little man was back, this time with friends. Jacob would like to have said that he laid them all out, that he finished the fight they had started, but with the onset of pneumonia and the fact that his five aggressors were armed with baseball bats and tire irons, he didn’t stand a chance.

Jacob didn’t know how he got to the veteran’s hospital, or after that to the veteran’s center down the road from it. He found himself on one of the numbered cots, his identity reduced to a series of numbers among many other numbers, all ordered and arranged and tagged like the good little soldiers they used to be. Amid the pain of a plethora of bruises and cracked ribs, Jacob obsessed over the name he had been reminded of, remembering in crisp detail his little brother’s faces and wondering what had happened to them, hoping it was something better than his own fate.

Curled in the fetal position facing the wall, Jacob slept uneasily on his cot, mumbling in his sleep.

“Joseph,” he called softly, “John…”

\---------------------------------------

“That time the veteran’s hospital checked me over, they thought maybe what was wrong with me was multiple sclerosis. From the toxins,” he explained. “They never really knew. They could never really determine why so many of us, so many soldiers who served in the Gulf War ended up sick, or dying too early. For me, it’s mostly my lungs and my skin that bother me. Lesions, both inside and outside. It’s why…it’s why I cough up blood occasionally. I get the flu every year,” he chuckled bitterly. “It’s amazing I even survived living on the streets,” he went on. “For a while I hoped I wouldn’t, I hoped I’d just die. Dying is better than living with the guilt I bear,” he said softly, clenching and unclenching a fist. “Some days I couldn’t even get out of bed thinking about it,” he said, his voice hopeless.

“You asked me before why I stayed with you and not my brothers. Joseph…I know he cares about me, but…I was just another tool for him to use, at the end of the day. I was the big scary older brother, there to protect him and there to keep our weapons from being taken. John...well, John’s a whole other bucket of problems. He barely remembered me by the time they found me at the veteran’s center in Georgia, only had memories of me burning down our foster parent’s house. I thought I was helping, but…” Jacob’s voice was haunted, and so quiet Tobias had to strain to hear, “turns out I just made everything worse. The people who adopted him, they were evil. They,” he swallowed hard, “They beat him. Tortured him. Turned him into…well, the only word for it is a ‘monster.’ They turned my baby brother into a monster, and it’s my fault he ended up with them. Every time I look at him, all I see is my failure. And every time I look at Joseph, all I see is my father. For all his kind words, and for all his piousness, he is just like our father – manipulative, easily angered…religious to the point of insanity. He may have been right about the end of the world, but he still scares the shit out of me sometimes.” Jacob’s brows bunched together in frustration. “He was just so kind as a kid. And John was so sweet.” His tone was pained, regretful.

There was a long pause. Tobias was still, silent, just listening.

“My greatest regret isn’t that I killed innocent people, it isn’t that I ate someone, it isn’t that I never left a legacy, it isn’t that I never found happiness or any of that bullshit,” Jacob told Tobias. “My greatest regret is that I let my brothers’ innocence be destroyed. And I don’t know if that’s something I can come back from, pup,” he whispered.

Tobias opened his mouth after he had thought for a moment, offering his own wisdom, what little of it he had.

“I…I think maybe you need to realize that your brother’s choices are not your own. Their justifications are not your own. You all did some evil, fucked up shit, yeah, but you thought you were doing it for good, or at least you thought it was your duty. I find myself hard-pressed to fault you for that,” Tobias admitted. “Besides, it’d make me a huge fuckin’ hypocrite,” he pointed out.

Jacob sat up slowly, reached for the glass of water Tobias had sat next to the cot for him, took a drink. He turned and looked at Tobias for a long moment.

“Well, I answered your question. I told you why I’m here with you, not with them. It’s because being around them makes me feel this profound…guilt,” he muttered, putting a hand to his chest as though it physically hurt him. His blue eyes flicked up and bored holes in Tobias as his expression shifted from regret to cunning, a chilling, antagonistic visage that made Tobias shift uncomfortably. Whatever wall their companionship had torn down over the past year was suddenly back. Once again the man sitting next to him was his enemy, not his friend. “You told me you wanted to help me. That you wanted to save me because of some bullshit about how then maybe you could save yourself. So here’s _my_ question, pup: are you so sure you or I deserve saving?”


	7. Checkmate

Tobias, much though he wanted to, did not turn Jacob’s sudden renewed hostility into an argument. Instead, he proceeded as though nothing had changed between them. If anything, he put more effort into helping Jacob, into being his friend. It was a new experience for him – it meant he had to swallow his pride. John had been right. Though the only thing the youngest Seed had succeeded in half-carving half-inking into Tobias’ chest was “PRI,” his assessment was absolutely correct. Pride flowed in Tobias’ veins like poison, but he didn’t want to argue with Jacob, didn’t want to fight, didn’t want to prove, after all, that he was the good guy and Jacob just needed to deal with his many unresolved issues. Because, at the end of the day, Tobias _got_ Jacob in a way probably no one else could, perhaps not even his brothers. He was fairly certain the admission of guilt he had heard slip from Jacob’s mouth was the first time Jacob had ever aired those feelings, those fears. Far be it from Tobias to lash back at a hurting Jacob.

So Tobias woke up early in the mornings, ran the shower hot and steaming to increase humidity in the bunker. He made tea or coffee for Jacob every afternoon, setting it down at the little area the man had declared his own at one end of the bunker and drinking none himself. He wanted to ration it so there would be plenty to help soothe Jacob’s raw throat throughout their stay down here. He saved the choicest portions of meat from his enormous freezer for Jacob and made it to his liking – well-done. Tobias wanted to tease Jacob about that, but he was pretty sure he knew exactly why Jacob couldn’t stand partially-cooked meat, so he didn’t bring it up.

If Jacob noticed the kind treatment, he did not comment on it – not until one day, months later. Tobias was setting a mug of French-pressed coffee down at Jacob’s small work area when the older man held up a hand to stop him, frowning.

“You can have it, pup. You look tired.” Tobias’ eyebrows rose.

“You sure?” Jacob met his eye.

“It ain’t fair for me to be the only one that gets coffee, kid. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.”

“Yeah, well, I’m hording the ibuprofen for myself, so I think we’re square.”

“Tobias.” Well that got his attention. Jacob never referred to him by his first name. He faltered, almost spilling the coffee. “Stop this,” Jacob said softly. He wasn’t looking at Tobias, was staring somewhere off into space. “You don’t have to do all this. I get it. I’m sorry. I was a dick…I’ve been acting like a dick for a while now.”

“Well, goddamn, sir,” Tobias said, using the respectful epithet as he generally did when teasing Jacob, “I do believe it is snowing in hell.”

“I’m not joking around, pup.” Jacob gave him a piercing look and turned his body fully to face Tobias where he sat. His face was serious, and earnest. “If I were half the man you are, maybe I wouldn’t have fucked my life up so bad,” he rumbled regretfully, scowling, his cheeks growing red after he had admitted this.

“All due respect, sir, you’re just as much the man I am. We both got dealt shitty cards, we both did the best we could. The way I see it, we can either learn from it or run from it.”

“You did not just quote the fucking ‘Lion King’ at me, kid.” Tobias grinned.

“I may have, sir.”

“Drop and give me fifty,” Jacob reposted. With a snort of laughter, Tobias complied, but he started laughing at around forty and couldn’t finish, instead sitting up with a glint in his eye. Jacob was staring at him with an unreadable expression.

“You really do think I deserve forgiveness, don’t you?”

“I believe everyone deserves forgiveness if they’re willing to earn it, yes,” Tobias said. His gaze went a little distant. “After that night I told you about, I had to learn to forgive myself. I had to forgive myself for becoming just as much a monster as the guy who killed my wife and kid.” He focused his gaze and met Jacob’s eyes. “But I never did manage to forgive him. The only thing that separates me from him is a willingness to change. To do better. It’s why I became a sniper, so I could kill the guys who were actually guilty of crimes instead of wiping out entire villages of mostly innocent people. It’s why I became a cop after I lost my eye and couldn’t re-enlist. It’s why I didn’t kill your brothers, or Rachel,” he confessed. “Or you.”

The silence in the room was palpable.

“You and I get out of here, you expect me to be, what, some kind of hero, helping save the world?” Jacob asked, his tone acerbic.

“No, but I do expect you to keep your brothers in line if you go back to them. Keep them on the straight and narrow. That would be true improvement, true growth, true change. You can’t fix the world, Jacob. But you can try to patch up one part of it.”

“And what if…what if I told you I wasn’t sure I want to go back to my brothers?”

“I’d tell you that I’m not surprised,” Tobias answered. He blew out a tight breath. “I have…a lot of half-siblings.” Jacob frowned.

“You never told me, it wasn’t in your file. We had you down as an only child.” Tobias chuckled at the confirmation that the cult had been studying him.

“No. No, it wouldn’t have been in any file. My life story’s a bit more complicated than the government could keep track of. Look, the point is, I have siblings too. I tried reaching out, tried being a good older brother, but it didn’t matter. One of them ended up dead in an alley with a needle in his arm. The rest were just as poverty-stricken and willfully ignorant as my birth mother. I realized something pretty early on, Jacob. You can only help the people who want help. You can only change the people who want to change. And if you aren’t sure which your brothers are, I can’t blame you for not wanting to open that can of worms.” Jacob huffed softly, taking a sip of the coffee and then handing it insistently to Tobias, who also took a sip, closing his eyes and savoring the taste. “So,” Tobias asked to fill the silence that had fallen between them as they shared the coffee, “if you don’t go with your brothers when we leave, where will you go?”

Jacob swallowed hard, looking away. His jaw clenched, ticked. He cleared his throat and scratched the back of his head before picking at a scab on his arm, a nervous habit he rarely let Tobias see. Finally, he gathered the courage to meet Tobias’ one eye.

“Was thinkin’,” he muttered, his voice soft and very quiet, “was thinkin’ wherever you went, I’d go,” he admitted. “Look, I know I’m an asshole, but you and I…”

“Yeah,” Tobias interrupted and Jacob looked relieved.

“And if you do go with your brothers? What’s your plan then?” Tobias pressed, voice quiet amid the sound of the generator and the soft static of the radio they kept on. Jacob growled low in his throat, wiping his face and then meeting Tobias’ eye again.

“We’ll cross that bridge if we come to it, pup.”

“Yes, sir,” Tobias said, and he drained the coffee.

“Tell me about your family,” Jacob requested softly, pulling out a boardgame set they sometimes used to pass the time. It had chess, checkers, and backgammon on it, complete with a little pull-out drawer that held all the pieces. Most frequently, they played chess. They had tried playing Monopoly and Sorry! in the past, but those games usually resulted in Tobias or Jacob losing their temper and flipping the table. Jacob started carefully setting up the chess pieces and Tobias sat across from him. For a few minutes, there was only silence.

“Did you know that psychologists have found that children who are old enough to remember their parents when they’re adopted by someone else tend to have a hard time forming relationships later in life?” Tobias asked, mostly rhetorical. Jacob chuckled bitterly, pulling a pawn off the board.

“I didn’t need a scientist to tell me that,” he rumbled. Tobias hummed.

“My biological mother Carrie was born to, well, we’ll just call her an exotic dancer. She was bounced around from house to house, was born hooked to meth already. Didn’t take long for California CPS to take her. A couple named William and Sue adopted her when she was three years old. They had always wanted two kids, but Sue got ovarian cancer after their son was born. So they adopted Carrie since they couldn’t have another of their own. They tried really hard to give her a good home, but something…something was broken in her from the start. She ran away dozens of times, tormented her older brother. By the time she was twelve, she was already addicted to crack, was hanging out with a bad crowd. She would disappear for weeks at a time, be found by police and returned to Sue and William. They tried therapy. Tried drugs. They tried everything, but she didn’t want help. She _hated_ them. She blamed them for taking her away from her mother. She accused William of molesting her, accused Sue of beating her. None of it was true, of course, but it still destroyed their reputation. William’s company went under in the midst of all of this. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was partly due to those accusations. After a while, they stopped looking for Carrie when she ran away. She started doing sex acts for drugs. Carrie terminated the first couple pregnancies, but William and Sue were very religious. They talked her out of a third abortion.” Tobias, rubbed his bottom lip with his thumb, face troubled. “Sometimes I really wish they hadn’t.” Distracted by telling his story, he accidentally let Jacob get too close. Jacob gently picked up Tobias’ rook, setting it to the side of the board.

“I was the result of that pregnancy. Never knew who my dad was, never really wanted to know. He was just some john. Sue and William tried to help Carrie raise me, but she would take me to parties and drug dens. I got sick a lot as a baby because of her neglect. Formed an addiction to God-knows-what-all from being in the room when she and her friends…her clients…would do drugs, usually heroin or meth. The last straw was when William found the house she was staying at. He found her unconscious on the couch with some guy. William found me sitting in a bathtub full of cold water I had shit in, crying. No one knows how long I was there, but I had hypothermia and some kind of skin infection from sitting in my filth with severe diaper rash. The cops said it was amazing I hadn’t drowned in the bathwater. William and Sue got guardianship of me after that. Not long after, Carrie tried to kidnap me, but they beat her to the punch. They packed me and everything they could fit in their car and drove to Texas where William had family. They tried to give me a good life, I know they did, but man, religion has a way of being really damaging, and we were fuckin’ dirt floor poor for a long time. I’m not going to get into all that shit, but it’s safe to say I’ve always struggled with anger issues, depression. They told me about my biological mother when I was eight because I found a picture of her.”

“What happened to their oldest?” Jacob asked, scowling when Tobias took his queen. Tobias chuckled humorlessly.

“The eighties were a bad time for a kid to come out as gay, especially to a hyper-religious family. Carrie had already put them all through shit. She had come home for the dozenth time after running away and William and Sue were pretty focused on her issues. I think William Junior – Billy – thought he could come out of the closet in the midst of all of that safely. But it still didn’t go over well. If anything it made it worse. He left when he was senior in college, before William and Sue moved to Texas, when I was about two. He never spoke to me or my adoptive parents ever again. Last I knew of him he was a successful psychologist in Illinois, I think.” Jacob chuckled.

“Ain’t that some shit?” he commented.

“Yeah,” Tobias agreed wryly. “He’s either the world’s worst therapist, or the best.”

“And your siblings?” Jacob probed, moving his king out of the path of Tobias’ knight.

“To be honest, I didn’t even know I had any until I was engaged to my wife. I got a Facebook message out of the blue from a guy who looked just like me, but about a decade younger. Turns out he was my half-brother. In the space of about five hours, my family had grown by about ten or twelve. Carrie messaged me.” He shook his head with a sigh. “She is…well, probably _was_ now, a real piece of work. Absolutely nuts. I tried getting her help, tried getting several of my half-siblings help, but I already mentioned how that ended. I tried for about a year to help them and they all ended up ganging up on me when I told them they needed to cut Carrie out of their lives. One of them tried to steal my identity, another showed up at my house demanding money. It took me a bit, but I eventually realized that you don’t have to tolerate someone just because you’re related to them. You can choose your family. And I learned that just because you love someone doesn’t mean you can save them from themselves. The best you can do is try.”

“Well, aren’t you just chock-full of wisdom,” Jacob commented with a little huff. Tobias shrugged.

“Never said I was wise. Just tellin’ you what I know.”

“You never regretted walking away from your siblings, from your birth mother?” Jacob asked him, brows pulled together in a look of concern and deep thought.

“Every fuckin’ day,” Tobias whispered, meeting Jacob’s eyes.

“I…” Jacob began, but he bit the inside of his cheek to stop himself. He wanted to admit what a burden it was trying to save his brothers, wanted to admit that if he could walk away clean, he would, but he couldn’t. His brothers needed him. For a moment, they were silent, then Jacob looked down at the board, moved a piece. “Checkmate,” he murmured, biting down everything else he wanted to say.

Down the hall, the radio crackled to life. They left it on almost constantly, but after nearly two years, had never picked up any clear transmissions. Until now.

“_Check, check…goddammit, is this thing on, Joseph?_” There was muttering and more swearing. Tobias and Jacob both went very pale. “_Jacob. Jacob, if you’re out there, this is John. Jacob, if you’re alive, please pick up. If you can give us your position, we’ll come for you_.”


	8. Radio Silence

The transmission continued, Joseph’s soft voice filling the stagnant air of the bunker, calling out for his brother.

Jacob stood abruptly, nearly knocking his chair over in his haste. He went straight toward the radio, reached for it and turned it off. He turned back to Tobias.

“So what happened to William and Sue?” he asked as casually as if he had just turned off static and not his brothers’ voices. Tobias sat, eyebrows high, his eye patch tugged upwards with the motion.

“Uh…well, they raised me, but they were closer to the age of being grandparents than parents by the time I came around. They weren’t the greatest parents, but at least they cared about me, at least they tried. I miss them,” Tobias admitted wistfully. “They passed away a couple of years before I met my wife. Uhm…anyway, aren’t you going to answer that?”

“So your adoptive parents never met your wife, huh? You told me she was a vet, right? Yeah, an animal doctor. Did she know about your siblings? Your past?” Jacob went on stubbornly, rearranging the chess pieces for another game.

“Jacob,” Tobias murmured, “we just heard the first radio transmission we’ve been able to pick up in two years. And it’s your brothers. I’m not saying you owe them an answer, but…don’t you want to?”

“I’m gonna make us some lunch,” Jacob told him by way of an answer. Tobias sighed.

“Stubborn asshole,” he muttered under his breath, walking to the radio.

“– brother if you’re hearing this, know that we are eagerly awaiting our New Eden. We need you here,” came Joseph’s soft voice now. Tobias turned the radio to the next frequency over and found that it was being transmitted there too.

“They’re broadcasting on all channels,” Tobias called to Jacob, who was puttering around in the kitchen area.

“We need our brother. More than that, we need our _soldier…_”

Tobias didn’t get to hear the rest of what Joseph said over the sound of an MRE being flung across the room and all the glasses on the counter being swiped off with an angry swat of Jacob’s arm. The glass and ceramic pieces shattered, raining chaos around Jacob where he stood leaning against the countertop, shaking. His teeth were bared in a feral expression and Tobias could see a vein in his temple pulsing rapidly. Quick to alleviate Jacob’s distress, Tobias switched the radio off, approaching his friend slowly.

“What did I tell you?” Jacob asked softly as he managed to calm himself. He looked at Tobias, an odd mixed expression of grief, anger and frustration on his face. “I was always only ever a tool to them. That’s all I’ll ever be to them.” Jacob coughed, covering his mouth with a hand. Tobias had noticed a strong correlation between stress and Jacob’s respiratory symptoms. Jacob cleared his throat, spat in the sink, wiped his mouth, sighed.

“The only way you can ever change their minds about your place in their lives is to talk to them, Jacob,” Tobias pointed out, holding out a placating hand when he saw Jacob’s shoulders tense. He knew he could take the guy in a fight, but he really, really didn’t want to.

“Sorry,” Jacob muttered after taking a deep breath, picking up a few of the larger pieces of glass and ceramic and dumping them into the trash compactor. Tobias said nothing else, just got the broom and dustpan. Silent, the two cleaned up the mess Jacob had made. When they were finished, Jacob lumbered over to the radio, turned it back on and just listened.

“– hope to hear from you, brother,” Joseph was saying. “I hope you survived. We’re here in your bunker. All your men are here. John and I came here after the bombs went off. Rachel chose to stay behind,” his voice went hard, accusatory, “chose to stay with one of the Resistance members. It is only the true Seeds now,” he murmured, “only us. Together we will march to Eden’s gate, and we will have our paradise together, my brother. We will keep trying to reach you.” There was a pause, a breath. “I love you, Jacob.”

Jacob was standing in front of the radio, one arm high up on the wall, his head bowed. He took a shuddering breath.

“We’ll leave it on,” he declared. Tobias nodded. A few hours later, John’s voice crackled into the room, eager and clipped, his refined accent covering his poor Georgian roots.

“Jacob, it’s John. Please. Answer us, if you can. Our prayers are with you, brother.” John sighed and in his mind, Tobias could just imagine the youngest Seed, his nose crinkled in consternation, his handsome face contorted into an expression of sadness for his missing brother. It almost made Tobias feel bad for him. Almost. “I know prayer doesn’t mean much to you, Jacob, but you have to know that we truly do want to find you. We want to help you. If you’re alone, we can find a way to get you to our bunker safely. If you are not, we can deal with that too.” There was a crackle of static and then a pregnant pause, as though John was waiting for Jacob to answer him. “We miss you, Jacob. We need you. Please. Answer us. Why didn’t you stay in your bunker? We know you were there, Jacob. Your men saw you with the deputy, they all heard you order that sniveling cretin Pratt be freed,” John mused. His voice grew soft over his next words: “So where are you, Jacob?”

The next day, right at six in the morning, Joseph’s voice woke them both.

“My brother. We are continuing the search for you. We have begun sending out scouts in radiation suits to investigate what resources are still available. We need you, brother. I know that God has kept you safe. I know that you are alive. I know our soldier will return to us to lead our army of faithful. We can help you if you need it. Please, just let us know your location. If anyone is listening and knows where our brother is, please contact us. We can offer you food and shelter if you help us find Jacob. If you are listening and you have our brother in your custody, know that there will be a reckoning when we find you,” Joseph promised, his voice dark. “God will not let you harm our brother,” he finished, his voice sure.

This went on for days, every few hours a pleading request that Jacob answer, a demand for his return if he was a prisoner, offers of reward if someone helped him get to their bunker, offering assistance, offering manpower, offering radiation suits, and food and companionship. And every day Jacob listened, and did not answer, nor did he allow Tobias to answer.

A crackle of static awoke both Tobias and Jacob from slumber nearly two weeks later.

The clock showed that it was three in the morning.

“Brother, it’s John.” There was a long, dramatic sigh. “I do not have Joseph’s faith in you,” he admitted. “I am…not certain that you would have come with us, if you were given a choice. You called for us when we found you in that veteran’s center so long ago, but…so much of your life was spent without us. You lived your life independently, not needing me or Joseph.” Another sigh. “I think perhaps you would have stayed with the deputy if you had the option.” That really got Jacob’s attention. He sat up, wiped his hair out of his face, stared at the radio. “You were two of a kind, brother. Don’t think that either Joseph or I missed that. All hard edges, all duty, all _honor_,” John monologued, sounding disgusted. “I remember you begging me not to kill him that night…” Tobias’ head swiveled to stare at Jacob, who was pointedly looking away from him. “When Joseph told me if I didn’t get the deputy to atone, that I would be barred from Eden’s Gates,” John whispered so softly that Tobias thought perhaps he was trying to hide this transmission from Joseph. “I wanted to wrap my fingers around his throat and _squeeze_,” he ground out. “I wanted to drown him in Bliss until he was just an oversized Angel. I hated him. I still hate him. His soul is rotting with his sin, with _pride_,” John hissed.

Tobias could tell from his tone that John was seething with barely-concealed rage when he talked about him. “I saw the same pride in you, Jacob,” John murmured. Glancing at the mostly-faded scar across Jacob’s broad chest, the red haze of hair across it partially obscuring it, Tobias swallowed. The expression on Jacob’s face was unreadable, dangerous, wild. It appeared no one had escaped John’s “baptism” and it seemed Jacob did not appreciate the reminder. John kept talking. “When I looked in that deputy’s eyes, it was like staring into yours, brother. I remembered how you fought Joseph, how you fought our parents. That defiance that existed purely for the sake of proving you were strong.” He huffed a noise of irritation over the air. “When he escaped my bunker and I sent my men after him, I ordered them to destroy him. But you called me even before Joseph could, desperate. You didn’t want me to kill him. You, of all people, who were always indifferent to mine and Joseph’s religious views, who were indifferent to our righteous machinations for the deputy – you begged for his safety like Christ begged for our sin-tainted souls before his Father. I wonder if you ever told Joseph how you plead for the deputy’s life? How you begged me to spare him? The deputy was a weakness for you before the Collapse, brother. And so I am forced to wonder if he is still your weakness now that the world has ended. I am forced to wonder if you have abandoned us for him.” Jacob still refused to look at Tobias after this revelation.

There was nearly a full minute of nothing but John’s breathing over the air, and then a spritz of static. More silence, waiting for Jacob to answer. He did not. John’s voice came again. “Jacob. Jacob. Jacob. Jaaay-cob,” John called, a mocking singsong. His tone shifted from one of gentle annoyance with a sibling to a tone of cold accusation. “I _know_ you’re with your deputy,” he grated over the radio, his voice rough and nasty, more akin to the clipped tone he used to use with Tobias than any he had ever used with his brother. “You’re both there, just northwest of the chalet, holed up in the bunker hidden under the garden shed. Isn’t. That. Right. Brother?” John snipped out.

Tobias’ blood ran cold.

“Did you forget you were last seen with him?” the youngest Seed hissed, his mouth sounding as though it was right up against the mic, close enough that his beard must have been scratching against it, that his spittle must be splattering it as he furiously accused Jacob of changing loyalties. “Did you forget how much we knew about him, how much I researched him? Did you forget how I tracked down his property before he ever had the nerve to put our brother in handcuffs? I know you are with him, brother. Are you sitting side-by-side, rapt with fury or with fear at your little brother calling you out?” There was a burst of manic laughter from John. “All you have to say is ‘yes.’ All you have to do is admit your mistake and we will let you back into our Eden, brother.” His radio mic crackled off, waiting once more for Jacob to respond. Tobias waited, his heart thundering in his ears. John knew where they were. When John broadcasted again, his voice was tight, furious. “You don’t have to do anything, Jacob. We’ll come for you.”

This time that last statement was not an offer. It was a threat. Jacob picked up the radio, fumbling it in his haste.

“John. Enough.”

“Brother,” hissed John’s voice. Tobias could hear the psychotic smile he knew was pasted on John’s face, knew Jacob had fallen deep into his brother’s trap. He knew they were in deep shit, or at least he was. Somehow he doubted Jacob’s friendship with him would protect him from John’s wrath. “About time you answered us.”

“You never did learn to leave a man in peace. Always had to fill silence with chatter,” Jacob said, thumb pressed lazily on the mic key.

“Please tell me you’re not with the deputy,” John begged. “Please, brother. Tell me you aren’t that stupid.” Jacob’s eyes flickered with irritation.

“Maybe if you were better company,” he retorted. John sighed loudly over the air.

“Unless you’ve brought our dear deputy into the fold–” Jacob cut him off.

“Things aren’t always as black and white as you and Joseph want to see them, Ace.”

“Don’t,” John snapped. “You don’t get to call me by the nickname you gave me if you’ve turned your back on me.” He sounded irate, but also near tears. “Jake,” John called, his voice breaking over the word. “Why didn’t you stay with us? Why did you go with _him?”_ Jacob finally met Tobias’ eye. He opened and closed his mouth, considering what to say.

“Because I can’t be your soldier anymore,” he said simply. There was profound silence after Jacob finished speaking. He waited for nearly five minutes, anticipating a response. “Ace?” No answer. “John?”

Nothing else was broadcast that day. Jacob and Tobias ate in comfortable silence, but Tobias was worried.

“I think we should bar the bunker door,” he suggested. Jacob huffed a laugh. “I’m serious, Jacob, I think we may be in danger. John didn’t sound very happy with you, and he’s not the most reasonable of people. We need to take this seriously,” Tobias said, raising his voice when he noticed Jacob chuckling.

“I’m not laughing because I think it’s a joke, pup,” Jacob commented, slapping his own thigh in amusement. “I’m laughing because you think you can keep John out if he decides to come here.” Tobias’ face paled. “If you’re a praying man, start praying,” Jacob chuckled, standing and picking up their plates. Jacob’s lack of concern both comforted and irritated Tobias.

“Great. So glad I’m stuck in the middle of this,” Tobias commented dryly, both annoyed and concerned. Jacob put a heavy hand comfortingly on his shoulder. He glanced up at his friend. Jacob rarely touched him. The contact of palm to shoulder was significant, as was the earnest look on Jacob’s face.

“If he so much as ruffles one hair on your head, I’ll knock him out, pup. You’re family now. And I don’t let _anyone_ hurt my family,” Jacob promised Tobias. “You’re my brother now.”

“Alright, _brother_,” Tobias murmured with a gentle smile, the word feeling strange in his mouth, but oddly right. “But I’m still barring the door.”


	9. 1 Corinthians 13:12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really didn't want to leave anything on a cliffhanger, so this one is about twice as long as the other chapters. Sorry, not sorry. This one was fun/stressful to write.

Nearly six months had passed since the last radio transmission from Jacob’s brothers. It seemed that John’s threat to come and get Jacob was hollow. Shortly after John let their argument end in radio silence, Joseph had sent out a final, disappointed transmission:

“I hoped you would return to the fold, brother. I hoped you would not allow pride and doubt to cloud your judgment. I was wrong. Farewell, Jacob.” Tobias had seen the pained expression on Jacob’s face at the gently scolding words, but had not known how to help, so he settled with distracting Jacob with games of chess or arm wrestling matches.

Almost inevitably, Tobias found himself promising Jacob they would go check on his brothers when they left the bunker. At his words, he saw soft gratitude in Jacob’s blue eyes that warmed both the cockles and subcockles of Tobias’ emotionally damaged heart. Either out of obligation, or out of love, Tobias wasn’t sure which, Jacob still tried to contact his brothers occasionally, but they never responded. The day Jacob tried to get John to answer the radio so that he could wish him a happy birthday was the day that Jacob stopped trying.

A few radio transmissions filtered in here and there, little pockets of survivors that occasionally chatted for the sake of having someone else to talk to, and to trade information. Jacob and Tobias mostly listened, keeping largely to themselves, though Tobias was pleased to hear from Sharky, Hurk, Grace, and many of his other friends. Pratt refused to speak to him since he was with Jacob, but Whitehorse had assured Tobias that he was fine.

Today was a lazy afternoon. There was not much that needed to be done. Laundry was clean, folded and put away, the kitchen was spotless. The cleanliness of the bathroom left something to be desired, but neither of them gave a shit about that. Jacob and Tobias had gotten some good exercise in and showered, and now they were lazily sprawled across one of the beds, watching an old episode of _Star Trek_ on Tobias’ tiny television and eating microwaved popcorn.

“_I’m so frightened, Captain_,” Uhura said onscreen. “_I’m so very frightened.”_

_ “That’s the way they want you to feel,” _Captain Kirk assured her._ “It makes them think that they’re alive,” _he said in a bitter tone, looking over to the enemy-of-the-week.

_ “I know it…but, I wish I could stop trembling.”_

_ “Try not to think of them,” _Kirk ordered his communications officer gently as their enemies laughed. _“Try…”_

_ “I’m thinking…I’m thinking of all the times on the _Enterprise _when I was scared to death and I would see you so busy at your command…and I would hear your voice from all parts of the ship, and my fears would fade…and now they’re making me tremble. I am not afraid. I am not…afraid.”_

Kirk was pressing a hard, stilted kiss to Uhura’s lips onscreen when the explosion went off.

A smoke grenade followed the massive shockwave and Tobias hacked and felt his lungs burning as he tried to suck in fresh air, reaching out in the haze of smoke for Jacob.

“J-Jacob?!” he gasped out, eyes swelling shut and nose running from the excruciating smoke that was gushing out of the grenade.

_“You’re half dead, all of you!”_ came William Shatner’s voice from the television, which was knocked over, dangling from its power cord, the screen flickering where something had shattered it, giving the roiling smoke an eerie, luminescent quality.

Tobias coughed and rolled onto the floor, trying to get under the smoke, which was rising and filling the small space of their bunker. He managed to pull his shirt over his mouth and sucked in clean air desperately.

“_We may disappear tomorrow, but at least we’re living now and you can’t stand that, can you? You’re half-crazy because there’s nothing inside, nothing! And you have to _torture_ us to convince yourselves you’re superior_,” Shatner’s voice as Captain Kirk declared over the shouting of men in the room, over the sound of frenetic footsteps and coughing.

Tobias felt for and found a familiar warm arm covered in scars and latched onto it, heart pounding, but just as he felt the owner’s fingers tighten around his own wrist in response, someone grabbed him by the hair.

John, Tobias realized, his face going pale with rage and fear.

_“He likes to play with knives,”_ the enemy’s voice purred onscreen, terrifyingly appropriate for the present situation. _“Very well, we shall indulge him.”_ Dramatic music filled the space from the buzzing speakers of the television and Tobias almost wanted to laugh at the absurdity of an attack set to 1960’s sci-fi combat music. Shaking the manic giggle that was trying to bubble out of him away, Tobias jerked his head back, trying to escape John’s grip, his scalp burning as the youngest Seed kept his fingers twisted in his hair.

“Jacob!” Tobias cried. With a snarl, John slammed the pommel of his knife into the side of Tobias’ head and he felt no more.

\--------------------------------

Jacob awoke, groggy, his throat sore and his head aching. He blinked owlishly, looking around him. The surroundings were familiar. This was his bed. _His_ bed, in _his_ bunker. He was dressed in the same clothes he had been wearing while watching _Star Trek_ with Tobias – a gray t-shirt that read “GO ARMY” and hunter green boxer briefs. Sitting up and wiping his red hair out of his face, he gripped the edge of the mattress, trying to piece together what had happened.

Out of instinct, he searched the room for Tobias, chest tightening when he realized that not only was Tobias gone, but that, no, he wasn’t imagining things, he was indeed in his own bunker. How did he get here?

“Tobias?” he called, voice rough. “Toby?” he asked, embarrassed at the desperation in his voice. He knew if Tobias was anywhere in earshot, he would have popped up immediately, irritated at the use of his least-favorite nickname. In a moment, the pieces all fell into place. “John!” Jacob screamed, standing in fury and stalking to the door, reaching for the handle and yanking it open – except that it didn’t budge. “John! Answer me, goddammit!” Like a trapped animal, Jacob paced back and forth in the small, utilitarian room, chest heaving. He found, humiliatingly, that there were tears gathering in his eyes as he felt panic overwhelming him. If John had gotten to Tobias without Jacob to protect him, then he was surely dead. “Tobias!” he called, a hard lump in his throat. “Tobias, answer me, goddammit!” He screamed, slamming his fists into the door with fury until his knuckles were bloody and every other breath was a rough cough splattering blood across the door and onto his chin. “TOBIAS!!!”

\-------------------------------

When Tobias came to, he had no idea how much time had passed, but he was fairly certain he knew where he was: Jacob’s Gate. He was hanging from cuffs by his wrists, the balls of his feet just reaching the ground. Nearby he smelled a half-rotten, half-dried corpse. It looked as though it had been there for a while, probably before the bombs dropped. Its head was covered with a linen bag and dried flowers were jammed into a long-desiccated chest cavity. Deer antlers were attached to the obscured skull with wire. John’s signature handiwork.

Well, fuck. This wasn’t good. There were crisp footsteps coming down what sounded like metal grate stairs. John stepped into the room, his hair pulled back into a short queue. He was wearing a wrinkled blue shirt and dark black jeans. His boots were neatly cleaned and shined, but he was nowhere near as put-together as he had been nearly three years ago, before the Collapse.

“What’s the matter, Johnny Boy?” Tobias croaked. “Did Prada stop taking blowjobs as currency? Did your credit line at Neiman Marcus run out?” In an instant, John had slammed a closed fist hard into Tobias’ nose and upper lip. “Hang on,” Tobias wheezed nasally, holding up a finger, “hang on, I had one more. I don’t know where you got your looks, but I hope you kept the receipt,” he giggled around a nose and lip dripping with blood. John snatched Tobias by the hair, tipping his face back. The youngest Seed stared into Tobias’ face, blue eyes roaming over the scruffiness of his beard, over the sheen of sweat and grease on his skin. “If you’re gonna kiss me, I gotta tell you, I’d prefer to suck your tongue, not the other way around,” Tobias informed him before he spit a gob of bloody saliva in John’s face with a playful grin. John just scowled, wiping the offending fluid away with his free hand and smearing it onto his jeans before untangling his fingers from Tobias’ hair. How the mighty had fallen, Tobias thought with a smirk.

“Always…so…prideful,” John ground out, teeth clenched. “That’s fine,” he muttered. “This time, we’ll strip that from you,” he promised, reaching behind him to his belt and pulling a large hunting knife out. “I don’t have my…tools…to mark you. That’s alright,” John shrugged, his gaze going dangerous. “This will do just fine.”

“Ooh, we finally gonna get those matching tramp stamps, girlfriend? Cuz, I was thinkin’ maybe we could get a purple butterfly just above our ass cheeks, but if you insist on ‘Live, love, laugh,’ I must insist it be done in Comic Sans,” Tobias told him in his best rendition of a valley girl accent.

“I am so going to enjoy carving your transgressions upon you, sinner,” John promised him, pressing the cool blade to his chest. Tobias met his cold eyes steadily.

“Do your worst, John. You really think it will change anything about how your brother feels about me? I’d bet it’ll just be one more thing that justifies how he already feels about you.” John snarled and grabbed Tobias’ chin, slamming it backwards, cracking the back of his skull against the concrete wall he was cuffed to. Tobias’ blood ran down Jacob’s face on the “ONLY YOU” propaganda poster behind him. John pressed the tip of his knife to Tobias’ chest and began to finish the long abandoned “PRIDE” he had partially carved onto the former deputy’s sternum. Tobias refused to cry out, refused to give John the satisfaction, though his nostrils flared with pain and he breathed a little harder, a little faster than he ordinarily would have. “Oh, ho, ho, that…” Tobias took a shuddery breath, surveying his gory chest, “looks good,” Tobias laughed, feeling hot blood running down his chest and onto his stomach. “Think you can touch up my tribal sleeve while you’re at it, boo?”

“Always so PRIDEFUL!” John screamed, grabbing Tobias by the throat. “Always so arrogant. Always so…” His face flickered, his brows rose and his eyes softened, “…so much like Jacob,” he admitted. He smiled at Tobias, an almost beatific expression on his face. “That’s okay. I’ll cut you from him the same way I’ll cut your sin from your soul. Piece by piece, until there is nothing left of you in him, until you can no longer even remember the meaning of the word ‘pride,’” John whispered. There was a mad light in his eyes that scared Tobias, though he never would have admitted that out loud. “You wait…right here,” John whispered in Tobias’ ear. Always a smartass, Tobias couldn’t resist placing a bloody kiss on John’s cheek. The youngest Seed’s lip curled in disgust as he pulled away.

“Call me!” Tobias yelled after him with a rough laugh. As soon as John was out of the room, Tobias took a massive breath, testing his bonds, feeling the dull ache of his dislocated shoulders. Groaning in misery, he tried to get his feet under him, tried to stand to relieve the pressure on his shoulder and wrist joints. Old training kicking in, he assessed his injuries, doing a mental checklist of all his limbs, all his fingers, his toes, his dick. Oh, who was he kidding? He checked the status of his dick first. Still attached, only a little bruised from a kick to the crotch.

Both of his shoulders were dislocated, he knew, and his nose was almost certainly broken. He was covered in a smattering of bruises and cuts, but no burns, he realized with relief. However he had been brought here, it had been protected from radiation. In his current state, there was no way to escape. He would have to bide his time and hope John made a mistake. Absently, he wondered if Joseph was responsible for this. More importantly, he wondered if Jacob was okay. More to the point, was Jacob in earshot, and if so, would he help? It was worth a try, Tobias thought, hopeful.

“Jacob!” he called. “Jacob! Jacob! It’s Tobias. A little help here?! Jacob!”

There was no answer.

\-----------------------------

“Where is Tobias?” Jacob demanded after someone shoved a plate of food under his door. They did not answer him, and he could hear footsteps moving away. Refusing to become weak from a hunger strike, he ate, wolfing down the bread and chili he had been given without bothering to sit down. It wasn’t very good, was probably something canned and off-brand. It left a weird taste at the back of the mouth. His vision went red and green at the edges. “Oh fuck,” he muttered, stumbling in place. Bliss. He should have recognized it as soon as it touched his tongue. Vision blurred, he dropped the bowl, flinging a mess across the floor and up one of the walls. He half-collapsed, barely catching himself on his old desk, his head swimming. “John!!!” he yelled at the top of his lungs, shuffling toward the door, half-crawling, half-dragging himself, but in a few moments, his world went dark.

“Sorry,” John said sweetly when Jacob awoke. He surveyed his surroundings yet again, realized he was strapped to a chair in one of the storage rooms. He heaved against the bonds, chest rising and falling with rapid, furious breaths. He tugged the ropes at his wrists and ankles, trying to escape as he met his brother’s eyes, rage flooding him. “It was the only way to safely get you in here,” John told his brother apologetically. “Well, I guess sorry for both the smoke bomb, and the Bliss, respectively. Both were required to keep you under control. You were never the most reasonable of people, to be fair.” Jacob was dangerously silent. John scratched the back of his head. “Sooo, it’s good to see you.” Jacob was silent, glaring. “How’ve you been?” Silence. John sighed. “I’m trying to help you, Jacob. Can’t you see that? You didn’t need him. You need your family.”

“He _is_ my family,” Jacob ground out, voice tight. John sighed, put a hand to his own forehead, spun on his heel away from Jacob. When he turned back, he had his palms flat together in front of his mouth, looking thoughtful. He moved his hands, clasping them behind his back and chuckling with a shake of his head.

“He was _not_ your family, Jacob. He was a distraction.” Jacob’s face went pale.

“Was?” John smirked.

“What? You didn’t think I brought your little pet here, did you? Come on, brother, you know me better than that.”

“Apparently I don’t know you at all,” Jacob growled, voice hitching toward the end of his sentence. “Where is he? What happened to him?” John narrowed his eyes, looked up to the ceiling.

“Hmm, ah, I don’t know, and uh, I don’t care. Probably dead, though. Almost certainly, actually. I told my men not to let him leave that bunker alive. Do you think he came after you? Sounds like he probably came after you, so my guess is that he’s dead.” John met Jacob’s eyes with disgust plain on his features as Jacob fought hard against tears.

“He–” Jacob’s voice was trembling, so he stopped, swallowed. “He was my best friend. My brother. And you killed him.”

_“I_ didn’t kill him. I just said he’s probably dead. There’s a difference,” John assured him, pacing back and forth. “And he’s _not_ your brother,” he hissed.

“Stop it with the lawyer bullshit, John. I ain’t interested. Let me go. I don’t want to be here.”

“You have to stay here,” John insisted. “I have to cleanse you of him. I have to make you pure again, brother.” Jacob clenched his jaw so hard he thought his teeth would crack.

“You know, when you and Joseph found me in that shelter, I thought, ‘This is it. Now my life can be good again.’ But you both just brought more pain into my life. You both manipulated me. Used me, like a tool, for your own gain. But even Joseph never went this far, John. I wondered, when you gave me all those notes on brainwashing, on manipulation tactics…” Jacob shook his head, grieving both his friend and his little brother. “I thought the military was bad, but you, you’re worse. You don’t just want to train men, you want to break them. How did you get like this, John?”

John snarled, striding forward and leaning over Jacob, his hands on Jacob’s forearms in a vice grip.

“You know full-well how I ended up like this,” he seethed, his spittle splattering Jacob’s face, his bared teeth glinting in the dull light of the room. “_You_ burned our foster parent’s house down and they sent me to live in hell.” And there it was. John still blamed him for his own miseries. Jacob exhaled a tired breath, shaking his head.

“You made your own choices, John,” Jacob said dully. “No one made you put a needle in your arm. No one made you give your body to the highest bidder. No one made you crucify people, or torment Mary May Fairgrave. No one made you this way but you, Ace.” When Jacob used his nickname, John got right in his face, which was exactly what he wanted. With a sudden jerk, Jacob slammed his forehead into John’s Roman nose. John cried out in pain, cupping his face as blood dribbled from his nose and down his shirt.

“We aren’t finished here,” John promised him, staggering backwards.

“What is your goal here, John? You want me to stay? Huh? You kill my best friend, and you attack me in my home, and you drug me and you expect me to, what? Just forget all that?”

“You weren’t in your right mind staying with the deputy. I did what I had to do to get you here. You’re dangerous,” John told him, his voice wary and uncertain. Jacob chuckled humorlessly.

“You’re goddamn right I am, Ace. Let me go.” John clenched his jaw and growled in frustration.

“I _have_ to get that deputy out of your mind, Jacob. Can’t you understand that?” John pleaded. Jacob shook his head with a disgusted sigh.

“You know, he could have been part of our family,” Jacob told John quietly. “I was going to come here. When the radiation faded. We had a plan.” His eyes were glittering with tears. “We were all going to be a family,” he breathed, his chest aching. John’s face went deadly grim, but his eyes softened. Rationality had returned to him, it seemed.

“If I untie you, will you let me leave this room unharmed?” he asked. Jacob nodded after a moment. John freed him from his bonds, and true to his word, Jacob let him leave without even moving a muscle. As soon as the door was closed, Jacob put his face in his hands and wept.

\---------------------------------------

“My brother has this…_idea_ that you could be part of our family,” John told Tobias, tone unreadable. He looked over at the bound man, one eyebrow quirked upwards. Tobias noticed that his nose was bloody and bruised. Interesting.

“That was the plan, yeah,” Tobias admitted. No sense in lying now. “He wanted to come here, after things were better. Wanted me to come with him. Not like this though,” he laughed, wincing when the motion made all his various injuries ache.

“I think you’re a distraction. I think you’re a symptom of his sin,” John hissed, raising Tobias’ chin with the tip of his knife. “I think I need to carve your name into his flesh and then strip it from him.”

“Look, I mean, whatever floats your boat, man, but carving my name onto Jacob sounds pretty fuckin’ gay. That’s not what Jacob and I have goin’ on.” John punched him hard in the gut. “Oh, oh, ho, ho, _shiiiiit_,” Tobias ground out in pain. “I think you misinterpreted me there, see, when I said it sounded gay, I didn’t mean to come across as bigoted. I have no problem with whatever lifestyle you or anyone else prefers. I’m just saying, Jacob and I are just friends. So if you think I want to fuck your brother instead of you, you don’t have to be jealous. You can lick my asshole any time you’d like, John,” Tobias smirked. The rage on John’s face would have been hilarious if Tobias didn’t recognize the look. It was a look that usually preceded another injury.

“I should slit your throat, right here and now. You have no respect for my brother, or my family. You have no respect for me,” John hissed, grabbing Tobias once again by the hair. If he kept this shit up, Tobias would be bald by the end of the day, he thought distractedly.

“No, no, now there you’re definitely wrong, Johnny Boy. I just think you need to loosen the fuck up. Maybe get your dick sucked a time or three so you can chill out. That’s not an offer, just so we’re clear.”

“What does my brother see in you?” John asked, flinging Tobias’ head back and pacing the room, knife in hand, movements choppy and frenetic.

“Himself, I’m guessing,” Tobias said tiredly. “A friend. I don’t know. Don’t you want to find out instead of, ugh,” he groaned in pain, “instead of torturing me to death?” John glared at him, but he paced forward, curious.

“Perhaps you’re right. Perhaps you can still be saved. Do you renounce your sins, Deputy?” Tobias sighed.

“I ever tell you I was raised religious, Johnny Boy? Mmmhmm. Dad was a deacon in the church. I never did believe much of it myself, but, you know, you spend enough time around something, you pick up a few things.”

“Your point?” John asked, voice clipped. Tobias chuckled.

“Let he who is without sin carve the first shitty tattoo, my dude.” John growled and Tobias flinched, knowing he was about to be struck or cut again. No blow came, so Tobias went on. “Here’s one you should be familiar with, bud: First John four, verse twenty: ‘Whoever claims to love God but hates his brother is a liar. Anyone who doesn’t love their brother cannot love God. Anyone who loves God must also love his brother.’” Tobias met John’s eyes evenly, though he was breathing hard due to all the injuries John had dealt him. “I’ve got another one for you,” Tobias continued, bringing up long-forgotten verses he had been forced to memorize as a kid, hoping it would help him forge a link with John, hoping it would help him deescalate the situation. “Romans fourteen verses ten and thirteen: ‘Why do you judge your brother? Why do you treat him with contempt? We will all stand before God’s judgment…therefore, let us stop passing judgement on one another,’” Tobias forced out, his shoulders aching, his nose and lips throbbing.

John looked bewildered at Tobias’ knowledge of the Bible, but instead of being apologetic, he was angry again.

“Do not presume to preach to me, sinner,” he hissed, face contorted into an expression of such pure hatred Tobias thought he would be dead if looks could kill. The tip of John’s knife was sitting threateningly against his jugular.

There was the sound of footsteps, and then the door opening. Into the room stepped a lanky preacher in a white shirt and black vest.

“Oh, look, the man himself,” Tobias announced mockingly.

“John.” Joseph stepped into the room, surveying the scene before him with fatherly disappointment. Stepping away from Tobias, John’s shoulders fell and his brow softened. He looked almost…childlike. “What is this?” Joseph asked, his voice soft, but demanding respect and obedience.

“I am…_attempting,_” John emphasized with a glance at Tobias, “to redeem the deputy.”

“Hmm.” Joseph pulled a handkerchief from his pocket (why was Tobias not surprised that he was the kind of guy to keep fucking handkerchiefs even in a post-apocalyptic world?) and gently patted it to Tobias’ nose, which was still sluggishly bleeding. Through a wince of pain, Tobias met his eyes past the usual yellow-tinted glasses. “Thank you for keeping our brother safe and sane, Deputy,” Joseph said. “We will care for him from here.”

“Don’t you think Jacob should make his own choices about how he would like to be treated?” Tobias pointed out, a little defensively. Joseph looked over to his younger brother, glanced over Tobias, shaking his head at John’s handiwork. Joseph called over his shoulder to some of his followers.

“Get this man some medical attention, and some food. Cut him down, John.”

“Joseph…”

“I said ‘cut him down,’” Joseph snapped, looking extremely displeased with his brother. “And let Jacob see him. I found our brother where you had him locked away like a prisoner. He was distraught over his deputy.” Joseph glared at John over the rim of his glasses, his face dangerous, his tone accusatory. Tobias was reminded of the video he had seen of Joseph scooping someone’s eyes out with his thumbs. It made him itchy, made his eyeball ache to think about it. Watching the two brothers was like watching a grizzly bear stare down a cougar. You weren’t really quite sure which would walk away alive. Joseph’s lip curled in anger and disgust at his younger brother. “You may have reached Eden’s Gates, brother, but you may still find the path through them barred to you,” Joseph hissed dangerously. John’s face fell, his skin paling. “We will discuss this later,” Joseph promised in a foreboding tone. He turned crisply to Tobias. “Deputy, I apologize for your treatment. Please understand that this was not part of my plan. My brother is often…misguided in his machinations.”

Tobias was too tired and pained to respond. Two cultists came in and unlocked the cuffs holding Tobias’ hands in place. As soon as his arms were freed, he collapsed to the floor, trying to rub at his wrists, feeling pins and needles in them, but his shoulders were excruciating to move. He was escorted to a medical area where a young doctor looked him over.

“I’m Dr. Allen, I’ll be assessing and treating your injuries,” the man told him, pulling on gloves.

“Tobias. Tobias Rook,” he introduced himself. “I’d offer to shake your hand, but…” Dr. Allen nodded, chuckled.

“We’ll take care of that,” he assured his patient. Tobias sat quietly, just glad he was no longer hanging in a storage room.

“Tobias?” asked a hopeful voice from the door. He turned, seeing a familiar head of wild red hair.

“Jacob,” Tobias said with relief.

“Oh Christ,” Jacob murmured, coming close, his movements hesitant, careful.

“I’d, uh, I’d hug you, but my arms don’t work at the moment,” Tobias joked.

“What the fuck did John do to you?”

“Oh, just a little touch up on my tat, no big,” Tobias assured his friend, looking down at the dried blood on his chest. Jacob sighed and then frowned, seeing the two odd lumps on Tobias’ shoulder joints.

“Your shoulders–” Jacob began.

“– are dislocated,” the doctor finished, meeting Jacob’s eyes carefully. He was one of Jacob’s men, well-trained and well-educated. Jacob liked him, and hoped he could still trust him. “Could I get some help with that?” he asked. Jacob nodded, swallowed.

“This is gonna hurt like a son-of-a-bitch,” Jacob told his friend.

“Oh, well, here I was hoping it would just hurt like a bitch,” Tobias said dryly as Dr. Allen braced his shoulder and Jacob took his arm. Tobias shrieked in agony when Jacob yanked his arm into place.

“Oh holy fuck, Jacob! Holy fuck! Goddammit! If you wanted to hold hands so bad, you shoulda just said so, champ,” he panted, gasping with pain. Jacob met his eye.

“That’s one.”

“Here’s two,” Dr. Allen murmured, holding Tobias’ arm. Another shriek that threatened to break Jacob’s heart.

“Oh, fuck you, Jesus Christ, fuck all of you Peggie _assholes_,” Tobias cried, throwing his head back. “Oh Christ, that fucking hurts!”

“We’ll put a sling on those in a few minutes,” Dr. Allen told Tobias.

“Both arms in a sling. Great,” Tobias sighed.

“In the meantime, here. Herald Jacob, can you please hold these on his shoulders?” Jacob nodded, taking the two icepacks Dr. Allen offered.

“_Herald?_ Really?” Tobias sniggered at Jacob. He rolled his eyes.

“Another one of John’s ideas,” he muttered. Tobias narrowed his eyes as Dr. Allen dabbed at his chest with antiseptic. He stared at Jacob, noticing the puffiness of the skin around his eyes, the redness rimming them.

“Holy shit. You _cried_ over me,” Tobias whispered in disbelief. Dr. Allen pointedly did not look up from his work.

“Shut the fuck up, pup, or I’ll dislocate your shoulder again,” Jacob rumbled. Tobias grinned up at him.

“You were sad when you thought I was gone.”

“I thought you were dead,” Jacob told him, voice haunted, face pale and expression pained. Tobias’ grin faltered.

“I’m good, man. We’re all good.”

\-------------------------------------

That night, Jacob couldn’t sleep. He tossed and turned in the silence of his room, unable to relax. He had become used to Tobias’ snores and snuffles and even his god-awful midnight farts. Decided, he left his room and padded down to where they had set up a room for Tobias. Giving the guard at the door a look that visibly withered the man, Jacob stepped inside.

Tobias jumped, sitting up and then groaning in pain when he realized it was just Jacob.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were startin’ to like me,” he teased Jacob as he laid back down gingerly, his shoulders carefully wrapped.

“Can’t sleep,” Jacob admitted. “Scoot over.”

“But what if my dad finds out you’re in here?” Tobias squeaked in his best impression of a teenage girl.

“Shut the fuck up and go to sleep, pup,” Jacob chuckled. They did not embrace, that was too far for two men who were just friends, but they did lay side-by-side with their ribs just touching. Though he was beginning to feel drowsy, Tobias remembered John’s bruised and bloody nose and curiosity suffused him.

“Did you break your little brother’s nose for me?” Tobias asked in the near darkness. Jacob barked a small laugh that shook the cheap mattress.

“Not just for you.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”


	10. You Judge Us

An uneasy and unspoken agreement not to harm one another was settled between John and Tobias over the course of the next month, though they avoided one another as much as possible. It seemed that it truly had not been Joseph’s plan to torture or otherwise harm Tobias. He had not advocated for Jacob’s retrieval either, figuring, like Jacob, that they would patch things up once it was safer to go out and explore. John had been the driving force behind getting Jacob here now, insisting upon it, insisting that the deputy’s influence on Jacob had to be stopped. Jacob had only had one conversation with John since his younger brother had lied to him about Tobias being dead.

“So. Why did you bring him here?” Jacob had asked quietly in the early morning where he had found John making coffee in one of the bunker’s kitchens. “I thought you hated him. Figured you would have left him to die or ordered his death like you said you did,” he continued, tone accusatory, face scrunched into an expression of profound hurt and distrust at his younger brother. John poured a cup of coffee, held it out to Jacob, who ignored it. The youngest Seed sighed, running his free hand through unruly brown-black hair that had not yet been brushed and tamed into the short, gel-coated queue he kept it in now that it had gotten longer. John narrowed his eyes in thought.

“Do you remember what happened?” he asked. Jacob frowned, blinking.

“I remember I hit my head. I don’t remember much else.”

“You were calling for him. Your deputy. Even after we knocked the door off the bunker, even after the smoke bombs, even after you saw my face, you were calling for him,” John told him bitterly. “‘Tobias,’” he mimicked. “It was the same tone, the same desperate cry as when Joseph and I found you calling _our_ names on a cot. When you were a nameless soldier, you cried for us. When you were a Herald, you cried for him.” John crossed his arms defensively over his chest. “I don’t understand, Jacob. Help me understand.” Jacob barked a humorless laugh, poured his own cup of coffee and gave John one final look before leaving the room.

“Your inability to cope with rejection is not my responsibility, John.”

John was left staring after his brother, the cup of coffee he held in his hand slowly scalding his palm until he noticed it and hissed in pain, slamming it down on the counter.

\-----------------------------------------------

There was an unspoken rule among the members of the Project at Eden’s Gate that no one used the third level bathroom. The third level bathroom contained only two showers, as opposed to the other level’s seven or ten, and was much more comfortable. There was ample cabinet space for storage of towels and other amenities, as well as a full-length mirror. The two glassed-in showers had built-in benches inside and had a removeable nozzle for a more relaxing and thorough shower. It was obvious that John had designed this bathroom, which was precisely why only John and occasionally Joseph used this bathroom. Tobias, of course, did not know this, nor would he have cared if he did. He stepped into the bathroom with a towel he had been given, glad for the chance at using recycled water that didn’t smell vaguely of urine and bleach as it had in his bunker. Inside one of the showers, he found a plethora of soaps, shampoos, conditioners and…he picked up a bottle labelled “beard conditioner,” which was not something he had known existed until he read the label. Shrugging, he turned the water to hot and sighed as a jet of high pressure water struck his body, soothing his aching shoulders and stinging against month-old wounds carved into him with a knife.

Tobias hummed to himself, enjoying the solitude the shower offered. Soon, humming turned to singing and singing turned into belting out Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” in a truly terrible falsetto into the end of one of the shampoo bottles he had fashioned a microphone.

_“…got drunk on the beach, got a motel and built a fort out of_ – OH JESUS CHRIST!” he hollered, nearly busting his ass on the slick tile floors as he turned and made eye contact with an extremely surprised John Seed who was standing just inside the bathroom door wearing a fluffy blue robe that was embroidered with tiny gold planes. Tobias stood awkwardly, as did John, who shuffled in place, his bare feet slapping on the tile floor.

“Uhm, this is usually _my_ shower,” John spluttered, not at all the smooth talker he usually was in the light of Tobias’ nudity, which could vaguely be seen through the foggy glass door of the shower. Realizing, Tobias clamped a hand over his more valuable parts.

“Oh, shit, my bad.”

“No, please, continue,” John said dryly. “I was enjoying your…_caterwauling._”

“I mean, you can join me in here if you’re in a hurry and insist on using _this_ shower, but I ain’t gettin’ out until I wash all the soap off my nuts,” Tobias informed him casually, going back to bathing himself now that it was clear John wasn’t about to kill him in cold blood. “And I don’t caterwaul, I croon.” John scoffed.

“Do you ever take anything seriously, deputy?” Tobias met his eyes and cocked his head back with a laugh.

“Should I take being caught naked in the bathroom by my mortal enemy seriously? Seems kinda like a cosmic joke to me,” Tobias mused. John barked an incredulous laugh.

“I’m your ‘mortal enemy’?” he asked, with air quotes.

“Nope,” Tobias informed him, pointing over John’s shoulder. “I fuckin’ hate spiders. He found me in here, naked, vulnerable. He’s just waiting for the perfect chance to strike,” he whispered conspiratorially, narrowing his eyes. John whipped around and let out a singularly unmanly sound when he noticed the small wolf spider clambering curiously up the wall.

“Oh shit,” John exclaimed, his back banging into the shower door. Tobias cackled at John’s reaction.

“Well, I don’t hate ‘em _that_ much.” Making a sound of displeasure, John flicked the spider off the wall with a towel and curled his lip with disgust.

“I don’t kill them,” he explained, “because they eat the other bugs in the bunker, but I don’t have to like them.”

“Yeah, I’ll take spiders over roaches,” Tobias laughed, rinsing his hair. John turned back to him abruptly.

“Huh.”

“What?” Tobias asked, squinting as he rinsed his face.

“I do believe we just agreed on something, deputy,” John pointed out.

“Well shit,” Tobias drawled, “Looks like this is the start of a beautiful friendship,” he said, mock-tearfully. John rolled his eyes.

“Are you nearly done?” John snapped, back to his normal self almost immediately.

“Yep, all yours,” Tobias told him, stepping out and dripping water everywhere. He didn’t miss how John’s eyes flicked to his missing eye, face going a little pale at the sight of the grizzled empty socket that was too fucked up for a glass eye to have been fitted. Tobais waited for the inevitable question, and, like clockwork, it came.

“How’d you lose your eye?” John asked quietly.

“Do you really want to know, or are you just making uncomfortable chitchat because you feel like you should?” Tobias griped, grabbing his towel and starting to dry off.

“See, this…that is exactly why I…” John clamped his mouth shut and breathed out slowly through his nose. “I’m trying, deputy.”

“Tobias,” he corrected. John huffed.

“_Tobias._ It would appear that you and I are going to have to learn to get along. I have seen the error of my ways–”

“Mostly because Joseph threatened you, I imagine,” Tobias interjected. John closed his eyes, slid his tongue around in his cheeks and clamped the bridge of his nose between forefinger and thumb, clearly frustrated nearly to the point of exploding.

“Yes,” he clipped out, jaw clenching, blue eyes flicking up to meet Tobias’ one hazel eye. “You didn’t fulfill the prophecy he thought you would, but the Collapse still came.” John chuckled bitterly. “Apparently you were supposed to kill all of us but Joseph.”

“I don’t make a habit of killing people if I can avoid it,” Tobias told him frankly.

“Yes, well, even if I were inclined to believe that, I know that with a rifle in your hands, nowhere in this bunker is out of range for you to kill me, so I suppose,” John went on, fussily grooming his beard in the mirror as he spoke, “I should at least try to see what my brother sees in you.”

“You really have to stop talking about me like I’m Jacob’s boyfriend.”

“Okay, will you please stop that?” John begged, flustered. “Stop joking about that. You know I…and then you…in the chapel,” he huffed and Tobias could see a vein ticking in the center of John’s forehead. He had to resist laughing at the apoplectic rage John was clearly trying not to fly into.

“Johnny Boy, I can’t ungrab your balls, man. You and I both know you were into me. I’ll stop hazin’ ya about it, but I don’t mean it to be mean,” he told the smaller man, eyes twinkling. John had gone bright red with embarrassment and he looked at Tobias helplessly before he suddenly started laughing. Real, genuine laughter that made his eyes crinkle at their edges and for just a moment, Tobias could see the young, innocent boy that Jacob mourned. He started laughing too and tucked his towel around his waist. “I can _try_ not to be such a dick, but I can’t make any guarantees I won’t piss you off.”

John shook his head, still laughing a little.

“You remind me so much of Jacob. I think it’s part of why you make me so angry,” he admitted, a look of realization coming over his handsome features. “Times were hard when we were young, as I’m quite certain he has told you, but we were still brothers, and we still did the things all brothers do. He would ruffle my hair, or give me wedgies or pin me down and,” he sighed in annoyance, “fart on me.” Tobias started cackling at that mental image.

“I’m guessing he still did shit like that to you as an adult?” Tobias asked. The look John gave him confirmed his suspicions and he laughed harder. John got serious again, and it put Tobias on edge in this small space. He planted his stance wide, ready for a fight. John’s face lost all traces of humor and there was that madness again.

“I still just can’t fathom why he left us for you in the first place, Tobias.” Tobias sniffed.

“I imagine some of it had to do with the fact that he’s…” he stopped, unsure how much of this was intended to be private, unsure if he should reveal Jacob’s profound guilt when he looked at John. He stopped, changed the end of his sentence, “He’s never been responsible for my well-being so he’s never had to worry about disappointing me. Family puts a lot of pressure on you. Maybe he just needed a break,” Tobias said carefully. “Try to forgive him, John. There’s a lot to unpack there,” Tobias told him hesitantly, feeling his face redden. He wasn’t good with mushy stuff. John nodded solemnly, scratching the back of his head with unease before he took off his robe and stepped into the shower. Tobias stood awkwardly for a moment before starting toward the door.

“Did you use _all_ my spearmint conditioner?!” John yelled after him shrilly. Tobias did a little spin before he opened the door, erecting both middle fingers at John with a wide grin before snatching John’s robe off the hook and ramming it onto his significantly wider shoulders. Even while trying to get along with John, he couldn’t resist a little mischief.

“Yep. And I’m borrowing your robe.” With that he flung the door wide, belting out Taylor Swift’s “Haters Gonna Hate” at the top of his lungs as he went.

“DEP-YOU-TEE!!!”

\-----------------------------------

“How is my brother’s deputy this morning?” Joseph asked a couple of months later as he stepped into one of the bunker’s common-areas, his tone teasing, but his eyes holding a glint of something sharp behind piss-colored glass. Tobias pursed his lips in irritation, setting down the book he was reading.

“Look, I get you’re from Georgia, I myself am from Texas, so I understand how you may have an inclination to think that people can still be property, but we kinda stopped doing that in 1865.” Joseph raised surprised brows, spluttered, affronted.

“What…I…that…is…_decidedly_ unfunny, deputy,” Joseph objected. He seemed truly offended at the half-joking accusation. Tobias glared.

“Well, you stop referring to me as Jacob’s property, and I’ll stop joking about Southern white men and slavery,” he riposted. Joseph opened and then shut his mouth, staring at Tobias. Finally, he clenched his jaw and shrugged.

“Fair enough. It was not intended to insult, deputy.”

“And that’s another thing,” Tobias said. “It’s been over three years since the fuckin’ world ended.” He saw Joseph flinch at the curse word and smirked. “So why don’t you stop callin’ me a _fuckin’_ deputy?” Tobias saw Joseph inhale through his nose before letting it out slowly from his mouth. He thought he could see Joseph mentally running through Bible verses to keep from strangling him.

“Very well,” Joseph told him, thin-lipped.

“Thank you,” Tobias told him sincerely. He saw Joseph deflate a little, calm.

“Deputy – er, Tobias?”

“Yeah?”

“For the record, while you and I have certainly had our…differences, I am glad my older brother has found someone he can confide in. He was never as comfortable coming to me with his troubles as he clearly is with you. He was more of a father figure than a brother to both John and I, and it complicated our relationship. While frankly I don’t prefer his choice of company…I am glad he has it.” Tobias stared at him for a moment.

“Thanks?” he said, tone unsure.

“I’ll be making lunch in the first floor kitchen if you would like some. It will be ready in a couple of hours,” Joseph told him, and then he was gone.

John, of all people, stepped into the room next. He spotted Tobias and froze, starting to step back out of the room.

“You don’t have to leave,” Tobias told him, standing. “My eye needs a break anyway,” he pointed out, indicating the book in his hand. John stuttered in place, finally decided to come in, holding a notebook and a little box of pencils. Tobias stretched and started to walk out of the room.

“Jacob won’t talk to me,” John said, sounding glum. Tobias paused.

“Well, to be fair, you kidnapped him and tortured his best friend. And you convinced him his best friend was dead. Have I mentioned that I’m his best friend?” John sighed.

“Never mind,” he said dismissively. Tobias sat back down.

“You okay?” Tobias asked the distressed-looking Seed. John’s jaw ticked.

“As though you’d care.”

“You think I waste my time asking things I don’t give a fuck about?” Tobias challenged. John surveyed him for a moment.

“I want my brother to talk to me again,” he admitted.

“I think you know better than I do, that’ll take time.” John hummed. Tobias stood to walk away again, unsure what other insight he could add.

“Please,” John stopped him, “don’t go. I’d…I’m bored. I draw when I’m bored, but I’ve drawn nearly everyone in the bunker five times already. Can I draw you?” It was an odd request, but not an unreasonable one. Tobias shrugged.

“Uh, I guess,” he said, and sat again.

“So,” John said as he opened his sketchbook and selected a pencil. “How did you lose your eye?” he asked again, sticking his tongue in the corner of his mouth and holding his thumb out with nail against his pencil to measure as Tobias spoke. John focused on his drawing and Tobias focused on his story and for once, there was peace between them.

“Is he bothering you?” Jacob asked an hour or so later, stepping into the room and giving his little brother a deeply suspicious look. Tobias laughed.

“What, you think I couldn’t take him?”

“‘Him’ is sitting right here,” John commented, shading a spot on his drawing.

“I was just telling your brother here the story of how I lost my eye,” Tobias informed him. Jacob chuckled, plopping down on the couch perpendicular to the one Tobias was sitting on.

“Which one?” Jacob asked. “The fork one?”

“No, the bottle rocket variation.”

“Hmm, good choice.”

“Uhm, what?” John interrupted, looking first to one, and then the other.

“Tobias here has about twelve variations of stories about how he lost his eye,” Jacob said, jutting a thumb at Tobias with a grin on his face.

“Twelve that you know of,” Tobias corrected him. John smiled and shook his head, continuing to sketch, looking first to his brother, then to Tobias as the two bantered back and forth, arguing, laughing, pulling John into their conversation occasionally. The tension between John and Jacob gradually dissolved and the three exchanged rowdy and inappropriate stories until Joseph appeared in the doorway, a little red-faced at part of the particularly filthy story he had overheard Tobias recounting.

“Lunch is ready. I thought perhaps it could be just the four of us?” Joseph asked, looking hopeful. John glanced to Jacob, who looked to Tobias, who shrugged at Joseph and then stood.

“Sure, I’m so hungry I could eat a horse, preacher.”

“I assure you the food situation isn’t that desperate yet, Tobias,” Joseph said with a small smile.

The four of them gathered around a small table and Joseph spooned out helpings of some sort of casserole he had made.

“Is this that old recipe I used to make us when we were kids?” Jacob asked after he took a bite. Joseph gave a tight smile.

“One and the same. I’d like to say grace,” he requested.

“Go ahead,” Tobias encouraged.

“Heavenly Father, I want to thank You for the food You have given us for nourishment. I want to thank You for family, and for friends, and for bringing them together through Your almighty plan–” Tobias snorted at that, but he disguised it as a sneeze. Jacob looked over at him with amusement. Joseph shot them both a disapproving look, but continued. “I ask that You watch over us, and continue to keep us safe, Lord. Help us to find strength in our differences, and give us all the grace to make friends of our enemies. It is in Your name we pray, Amen.”

“Amen,” the rest of the table echoed.

“So, Tobias,” Joseph said softly, “I understand that Jacob has accepted you as part of our family.”

“He has…” Tobias glanced at Jacob, “He considers me his brother,” he explained carefully. Jacob was silent, his face indicating Joseph could go fly a kite if he had a problem with that. Joseph hummed, blinked.

“Well. If you are my brother’s brother, then surely you are my brother as well?”

“I, uh, I guess so, yeah,” Tobias said, a little uncomfortable, but sensing progress. Joseph’s questions didn’t seem loaded.

“Good. I’ve already given you free roam throughout the bunker. I know Jacob has taken you down to the gun range. I have only one request, Tobias,” Joseph told him. Tobias frowned. “If you are part of our family, then you have to be willing to protect and serve our family. I am willing to set aside our differences, and to expunge past crimes on both sides. Are you?”

“Within reason,” Tobias answered evenly. Joseph nodded once, glanced to Jacob, and then back to Tobias.

“You _judge_ us,” Joseph said quietly, repeating his words from years before. He held up a hand as Tobias opened his mouth to object. “I mean,” he clarified, “you are very perceptive. You are acutely aware of wrong and right. It makes you a…complicated man to deal with. It also makes you very valuable. I have given it a great deal of thought and prayer. There is a job for you, within our family, if you’ll have it,” Joseph told Tobias, leaning forward intently and steepling his hands together over the table. Tobias met his eyes steadily.

“I’m listening.”

\-----------------------------------

As with any family, the Seeds, Tobias included, had their problems. They fought, they argued, they forgave. It took time to overcome their differences, and for each of them to swallow their pride and tame their wrath. Jacob eventually forgave John for his actions against both him and Tobias. John accepted his own faults and forgave Jacob for his role in John’s placement with the Duncans. Joseph and Tobias grew close as well, both understanding the loss of a spouse and a child. Joseph further explained the death of his daughter, telling Tobias about how she had been suffering, about how she would never walk and was likely to die before her third birthday. Tears welling in his eyes, Joseph explained how he couldn’t let her live like that. When he looked into Tobias’ eye, he didn’t find judgment there, but understanding. Tobias told Joseph about Jermaine. John opened up to Tobias about his experience with the Duncans, and Tobias shared the story of his mother, and his siblings. They all shared a common agony, they all knew one another’s pain, and they each did their part to alleviate the others’ suffering by sharing their experiences.

With Tobias as a link between both groups, the Resistance and the Project eventually began to forgive one another for past hurts, talking and socializing over the radio. Even Rachel, once known as Faith Seed, had been forgiven and talked to Joseph regularly.

Seven years after the bombs dropped, the Seed family stepped outside into a New Eden.

Resources were limited, but the survivors of Hope county worked side-by-side, growing food, raising animals and living in peace. The occasional troublemaker passed through, but was swiftly removed or dispatched.

Those who chose to stay with the Seed family and follow Joseph’s teachings built simple houses near the river, while others reoccupied old buildings that had been transformed by both the bombs and time. The group of houses and trading posts nearest Joseph’s old compound became known as New Eden, while the Resistance rebuilt and revamped Fall’s End to the southwest. Kim and Nick Rye established another outpost at John’s old ranch after he agreed (hesitantly) to give it to them as reparation for his abuse of Nick years before. They called the area Prosperity.

Tobias was granted Herald status, and stuck close by his friend Jacob, choosing companionship over solitude. He was a valued member of both the Resistance and the Project, a friendly face who decided where manpower and resources were distributed as they rebuilt their new world. It went to his head, just a little. You can’t blame him, he did have the word “PRIDE” carved on his chest, after all.

“You look like a jackass,” Jacob told Tobias as he surveyed his friend’s new addition to his outfit. Tobias turned toward him, a white wooden mask completely obscuring his face beneath his jacket hood. They were both dressed in leather and wool clothing with fur capes covering their shoulders. Their pre-Collapse clothing had worn thin after years of farming, building and hunting. Jacob still stubbornly wore his dog tags, whistle and lucky rabbit foot over his handmade clothing.

“What? I spent hours carving this thing,” Tobias said, pulling the eerie wooden mask off, looking hurt. Jacob rolled his eyes.

“Can you even see in that thing?” Jacob asked skeptically.

“I thought it looked cool,” Tobias said, voice disappointed. “Come on, Joseph gives me an awesome Herald name, I wanted a badass look to go with it.”

“Speaking of, kid, I am _not_ calling you ‘the Judge,’” Jacob grumbled.

“You are absolutely no fun, Red,” Tobias whined.

“Should call him ‘Gray,’ it’s more accurate now,” John snarked, sauntering past them.

“Hey fuck you,” Jacob retorted, but there was no real sting in his words.

Much to Tobias’ relief, Jacob’s Gulf War Syndrome symptoms had lessened. His cough was nearly non-existent in the fresh air of the new world. Though his red hair had started to gray, he had never looked healthier, or more at peace.


	11. Epilogue

Twenty years to the day the bombs had dropped, a mostly gray-headed Jacob stared longingly out at the Whitetail Mountains whistling “Only You.”

“You’re about to take off into those mountains, aren’t you?” Tobias asked, wincing as his knee popped when he approached. Tobias had just turned sixty-three, Jacob was seventy-two and just as crotchety as ever, if not more so.

“Gettin’ old and forgetful,” Jacob griped. “Vision’s going. You know what wolves do when they’re too old to hunt, pup?” Jacob asked in his gravelly tone. Tobias hummed.

“I figure they wander off into the woods to die,” he muttered, looking at his friend with concern. “You know there’s another option, you old fart.” Jacob looked over at him, his blue eyes gone a little foggy with cataracts.

“Hmm, what’s that?”

“Goddammit, you old fucker, we gotta learn how to make hearing aids again, shit fire! I said there’s another option rather than wanderin’ off into the woods like an Alzheimer’s patient, you stubborn fuck.”

“Hmm?” Jacob asked.

“You come stay with your friend and he makes sure you die happy and old in your own bed instead of dying of exposure like a lunatic. Don’t you take off on me, Jacob Seed. I ain’t lettin’ you die today or any other day, brother.”

“And here I thought seven years would be an eternity. At this rate I’ll never be rid of you, pup,” Jacob griped, but he offered no objection as Tobias arranged for his things to be moved to his house.

\------------------------------------------

Many years later, Hope County had become the central hub of humanity, a gathering place for those seeking help and companionship. As travelers came from far and wide, many of them told stories of seeing two wolves in the woods outside New Eden, one red and one golden, though others swore there were at least two more, one brown and one black.

The wolves always disappeared if you looked right at them, or so the stories went, but their presence became known as a sign of good luck, an indication that your journey was safe, and that your family would pass through unharmed.

“To this day,” Carmina Rye told her grandchildren by the light of their campfire, “they say that the wolves are watching over us all, making sure that all the families of Hope County are safe.”

“That sounds made up,” one of the children objected skeptically, but he jumped at a sudden sound. In the distance, two wolves howled atop a tall hill, an eerie, but oddly comforting noise in the quiet of the night. Carmina shrugged and met her husband Ethan’s eye with a small, knowing smile.

THE END


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